Demon Girl
by Sauri
Summary: [Gruvia] [Parallel Universe] In which Juvia is one of Zeref's demon, Gray never went to where he should have gone and the world is not quite as it should be. And it's an utter, colossal mess.
1. The Meeting

**Notes:** No worthwhile comments except this fic will crash and burn and shatter and I love it. This chapter and the next two are kind of a "prologue" and the fic won't be up with the beginning of the manga until the third chapter. Theoretically.

Reminder English is my third language so for typos or shit like that I'd be reaaally happy if you'd tell me.

Read and enjoy.

 **Summary:** [Gruvia] In which Juvia is one of Zeref's demon, Gray never went to where he should have gone and the world is not quite as it should be. And it's an utter, colossal mess.

 **Warnings:** This story may contain the following: some OCs as supporting cast, divergence from the manga, continuous swearing, some violent scenes and some sexual scenes, too. If anything else springs up later on, it will be added here.

 **Disclaimer:** Fairy Tail and everything related to it belongs to Mashima and so on ad so forth.

* * *

 **Demon Girl**

 _The Meeting_

Gray Fullbuster wanted to go west―or intended to do so, at least, once upon a time.

When years had passed and he looked back to this particular point of his life, he would wonder about what would have happened if he had gone through with his decision. But, as it was the case, an nine years old travelling alone with just a vague destination in mind was not doable. Even less so when hunger, poverty and nakedness came in a for the most part cold day of winter, all of them coming together and coming _hard._ He had to change his plans.

Gray had not been happy with the idea.

There were, thankfully, public mission boards in every major city for any wandering mages like him, put together by those people who couldn't afford the high prices of a proper guild's help.

"If you're ever in need of something, use these," Ur had explained to them back when everything was as it should be. She had smiled even when he'd scowled. "They pay might not be the best, but it saves you a lot of problems."

And she'd been right. She always was.

He found a request seemingly made for him, and then smirked when he read the 'free logging and food for as long as it's necessary' scrawled at the bottom of the paper.

"Good," he muttered to himself at the time. "Something less to worry about."

Things, after all, hardly went his way for the most part.

The anxiety came afterwards, when facing the bear-shaped man whose beetle eyes scanned him. Gray felt very, very small then. The man's nose scrunched and Gray shriveled in embarrassment. He should have thought this more throughout―he should have bought clothes, too, before applying for the work. Gray doubted that being half-naked left any good first impressions.

"Ye sure, lad?" the bear-man inquired uncertainly. "Ain't ya a bit… _young_? Not dat I mind if yer can do the job."

Gray sniffed, feet swinging awkwardly since the chair was a bit too big for him. The mission pamphlet wrinkled between his fingers.

"Yeah, sure. I can do it," he retorted and then glared at him to show that, no, he was in no way too young. "Although I don't what's the problem―you say that there's something that's holding you back in the ice-mines, but why couldn't you dig it out by yourself―"

The man grunted. "It's…" He shook his head. "Y'll see. I hope yer prepared for it, though."

Gray frowned.

"Uh, okay. Whatever." He shrugged. He got this. "Anyway. Can we start tomorrow though? I―I've been travelin' all day and I'm tired and... So―can I?"

ooOOooOOoo

Daffodil Town's mines hollowed out deep into the earth, tunnel after tunnel extending without an end. Some people scattered along, picking and carrying the chunks of ice out of the cave. Gray watched as he followed Gustav, the giant, hairy man, down the zigzagging path of the mines. There was something electrifying, behind the cold and the noise of breaking frost, and it floored the air with a sensation that prickled his skin.

Gray stopped walking, touched the ice and gasped in recognition.

"It's magic ice," he mumbled in awe.

"Aye. Our mines're unique in dat. Impressive, eh?" said Gustav with a wink. "We're reachin' the place. Just 'round the corner."

Gray nodded, his movements stiff as he approached his first big job. Briefly, he glanced down to check that all his clothes were in place instead of dropped somewhere behind them. They weren't. Which was good. He could do this, he thought. He could even do a much better job than anyone would expect of him.

Of course he could.

When Gray looked up, however, he found Gustav gazing down on him with an odd expression―amused as the corners of his mouth tugged upwards. Gray scowled not liking it, and glowered.

"What?"

"Nothin'," Gustav mused. He stroked his beard. "The doc's waitin' fer us in there. Yer ready?"

"Yeah," said Gray, firmly.

The older man bobbed his head and patted him on the back.

"Good." Then, they stepped forward.

The little chamber in the heart of the mountain got colder, in a sense that didn't quite fit for this kind of cold was only found in the middle of blizzards you were never supposed to come out of, and there was something, a black blurry encased in ice, further on.

As they got closer, Gray discovered that it was a _she_ of his age what was captive of the frost and cold, and that she was very much naked, too.

And Gray might have blushed at that, the girl being cute with her blue hair and pretty eyelashes (and naked!), but instead he remembered that she was a very naked girl encased in very magical ice _._

Magic ice that, as far as he'd learned and hated, was meant to _imprison_ things that should stay imprisoned.

"No. I'm not doing this," Gray breathed harshly. He scrambled on the floor, lips curling into a sneer as his body went taut. "No, no, no. This is not good! _Not_ doing this! I-I can't… I—!"

"Kiddo! Keep it together!" Gustav urged.

"No, I— You can't—it's magic ice, it's not good. My master—she did—and—"

"Boy, look at me."

"W-what." Gray was dimly aware that it had been a new voice. He could make the face of an old woman in front of him, but his head was dizzy and nothing did much sense.

He could only see Ur dying and smiling, and Deliora going down with her, and—

He smelled an aroma, sensed a hand rubbing his back and before long the world focused once again. Two fretting faces were watching him. Gustav and, probably, the doctor, Gray thought. Not Ur; not Deliora.

" _Breathe_ , child, I don't feel like takin' care of an anxiety attack," the woman soothed. "Better?"

Gray did as told. He breathed in, even though his muscles ached and his eyes stung with unshed tears. He looked up to face Gustav with his worried face.

He breathed out.

"Are you… are you sure about _this?"_ he managed to spew. "About getting _that_ out of there?"

The two adults shared a look that made Gray squirm.

"What do you mean, boy?" the doctor asked.

" _Nothing_ ," Gray gritted, a warning as glaring as the sun, "that comes out from ice― _worse_ , magic ice— is bound to be good. It's supposed to _stay_ that way."

It was such an obvious thing to point out, too. They really should not free that thing. Ever.

But―

Gustav sighed.

"We need this, kid," he said.

ooOOooOOoo

"Good, boy, keep up," Evelina, the doctor, praised. "Continue unfreezing like this and soak her with hot water. I'm goin' for my medical kit now."

"Yes, ma'am," Gray said.

Evelina smirked, patted him and left. Gray huffed. He was hungry and tired and he'd had been holed up in the mines for so long, thawing an ice almost impossible to thaw even with magic, that it had to be night. Yet, he didn't understand why he was doing this.

His warnings and stories had fallen in deaf ears. It was the right thing to do, he had been told with a sympathetic look, to save the girl and wake her up and give her a chance to prove herself. The human thing, they said, regardless of what could happen if otherwise.

Gray scoffed at that, his stomach lurching at the idea, decided he wouldn't allow any of it and then almost screamed when a hand grabbed his own.

The frozen girl, with her wild azure locks and pretty long lashes, had awoken. She also had coal-like eyes and a snarl in her mouth and Gray noted that what stood before his bare eyes was not just the sudden picture of a girl of his age who pierced a defiant stare in his direction, but the possible demon he knew she could be.

The girl gulped, frightened and tired, and croaked, "Who are you?"

Then she fainted again.

"What," Gray hissed after recovering from the shock, still trembling and voice cracking, "was that."

ooOOooOOoo

"What are you?" Gray asked three days after the villagers took her in. He had been keeping a watch over her. " _Don't_ lie. I _know_ you aren't normal― as a _human_ , which I bet you are _not._ No one ends up imprisoned like you did if they didn't do something _._ Because—because…" He sniffled while glowering at the bed-ridden girl who was intently watching him and finally said, "So, _what_ are you?"

She didn't flinch, nor move, nor defend herself. It didn't dwell well with him, her made-up serenity grating on his nerves, much less when the smell of someone who had been sleeping for days stank and the sounds from the doctor at the other side of the wooden door clattered.

The downpour that followed rattled against the window with a sonorous tap-tap.

She smiled at last, a stiff, acerbic smile, and said, "Juvia doesn't know what mister's talking about."

Gray snorted crudely.

"Of course you don't."

ooOOooOOoo

"Boy, don't worry so much," Gustav prodded as Gray stabbed some vegetables around the plate. He didn't like vegetables—nasty things. "Not like I mind havin' ye around ―yer a big help, actually― but she don't look like trouble to me."

Gray frowned at the pork, shook his head and glanced through the window to the doctor's house on the other side. "I'm eight and you're big and strong and _still_ I could beat you up 'coz I can summon ice swords at will."

Gustav went stock-still with the pint on hand. "Point taken," he conceded. "Although I doubt yer winnin' against me, kid."

Gray pouted and stabbed some more.

ooOOooOOoo

She was combing her hair while watching him and he watched her in turn, silently aggressive. For the last week it had been like that—a battle of glares. And, sometimes, even though he didn't want to, she would spark a conversation.

"Mister's always here. With Juvia," she commented, airily. "But Juvia doesn't know what your name is yet."

"And?" Gray sighed.

"And Juvia'd like to know," the girl went on. "After all, she only knows you and Evelina-sama. Juvia thinks it's only proper."

Gray stared, for the first time his stoic expression crumbling down in confusion. "Evelina-sama?"

"Hmm." She smiled. "Doctor-sama's name. She forced Juvia to call her by name but Juvia still wanted to be polite."

Gray huffed, the smell of medicinal herbs aggravating and her big eyes ―still too dark and too harsh― haunting him. He inhaled, aversion settling at the pit of his stomach.

"If you say so."

The girl squared her shoulders and shyly extended a welcoming hand.

"Juvia Lockser."

Gray squinted at the hand.

"Already guessed that. You say it, like, _all_ the time."

The arm fell.

"Why does mister distrust Juvia so much?" she asked, eyebrows knotting together.

" 'Coz I know what demons are made of."

Juvia Lockser tilted her head, hands clasping together on her lap. Not for the first time Gray noticed how her hair bounced each time she bobbed and how her skin glistered pale―too white and too smooth to be considered ordinary― and how her lips curled down and how there was this little wrinkle forming just between her dark eyes.

It was like a dream; her and her attitude and how she carried herself―a nightmare, actually, Gray thought, not a dream. It fitted her.

"But Juvia isn't a demon," she said, finally.

He frowned at her. She puckered.

"I dunno that."

It didn't help his mood that it started to rain again.

ooOOooOOoo

The smoke cleared out, ashes dirtying the lounge where once there was furniture, and the water stream subsided until it disappeared. The fire was gone. Gray panted, an ice-shield in his hands. He glared at the girl of pretty wet hair and wet dress.

"You!" he began, except he was cut out when the old doctor called from behind him, "Juvia, was this your doing?" she asked. "Was that water magic?"

The cursed girl looked up, skin white as paper, then down to her hands and hid them behind herself.

"…yes," she mumbled after awhile. "Juvia's sorry! Juvia's sorry for soaking Evelina-sama's home and not telling a-about—! But Juvia thought it'd be best if she put out the fire quickly and―"

"No, it's okay." Evelina reassured with a gentleness Gray had rarely seen in her. "It's my fault for not payin' attention to the food in the first place. You did good."

Gray bristled. Juvia smiled with wide, amazed eyes.

"Juvia's glad."

This couldn't be.

It didn't make sense―the weird girl and her weird magic and the weird setting.

Did demons even use _magic?_ Gray wondered and shook his head, because, no, they did not.

He had heard stories of people who had wings and claws and face brought from the underworld that passed as demons in the north and could use the occasional low-level caster magic. But those weren't no more than another race, he was sure of, so unlike Zeref's true demons, monsters for destruction and pillaging.

He recalled Deliora, with all his brute force and destructive powers, and remembered how his attacks had looked like magic―raw and feral and capable of taking away much more than what it gave. But it had only _looked like._ There had been something fundamentally wrong with Deliora's magic: something different, something darker, something hateful, and so very, very _old_ that―

"Well, I'll have to call the carpenter now to help us sort this out," Evelina said. She was about to cross the door when she turned around and grinned. "Thank you. To both of you."

Gray watched her go, his own ice melting away, before a snarl crossed his lips and he locked eyes with the strange girl that seemed more withdrawn that he had ever her seen be. She seemed afraid. His throat dried.

There was something nagging him at the back of his mind, something important, and his chest constricted.

"You can…" He paused. "You can use magic?"

There was a beat of silence. She sighed, sniffled and curled a finger around a lock of blue hair, shrugging.

"Yes. Juvia can. Kind of." She pointed his shield. "Like you."

Gray pressed.

"Since when?"

"Always," Juvia answered right back. She even dared to pull an annoyed expression. "Those are some silly questions."

"Excuse _me_ for not knowing _,_ " he scoffed as his lips twisted downwards. "You coulda say so, y'know. About your magic."

She shrugged.

"There wasn't a reason to. Juvia didn't think it was important."

"We'd have avoided a surprise of suddenly seeing water coming out of the blue and wondering what the heck's wrong in this place."

Juvia shrugged again.

Gray scowled.

It truly didn't make sense _,_ but it did, at the same time. Her magic, or what she called magic, had been fleeting, but natural with the intangible force and rush of strength he was so familiar with. She was frightened, too, however, and Gray wondered and wondered and wondered why if there truly was nothing to be afraid of.

So he watched her, watched how she hunched and watched how she fidgeted. Watched how she flinched when the smell of fresh damp wood flooded their nose, the humidity adhered to their skin and thunder echoed in the distance. It was about to rain. And he watched as her eyebrows quirked and eyes darkened with gloom, and he watched the window as it started to rain.

When he looked back at her, she avoided his gaze.

ooOOooOOoo

Gray was handed with the task of teaching Juvia the ropes, as Gustav put it. 'If you wanna eat an' sleep in our homes,' he had said as well, 'ye better work. And fer that yer hafta teach her'.

He hated it before it'd started.

"Not like _that,_ " Gray sneered with the belt already half-undone and jacket long thrown out. "You gotta hold them from below, like _this_ , take'em out carefully so they don't break and _then_ ―"

The block of ice fell to the floor, leaving in its wake a million of tiny shards that miraculously didn't cut them, and, as his cheeks heated, the girl contained a giggle next to him.

"Ugh," Gray groaned, glaring at the mess and then at the girl. "Not a word."

Her smirk widened.

"But Juvia didn't say a thing," Juvia said.

His glare narrowed.

"Smartass," he muttered low enough not to be heard. " _Anyway._ You get it, yes? You hold it carefully, carry it and put it in the mine cars."

Juvia nodded at the same time she snuggled deeper into the borrowed coat. She didn't move after that, instead staying put and observing the ice-walls that expanded into long corridors.

"What?" Gray asked.

"Juvia doesn't understand," she started slowly, "why are we―they, Juvia supposes―mining _ice_ of all things. There's plenty outside here."

"It's magic ice," he deadpanned.

"Juvia knows, but _why_?"

Gray considered her question, considered her intense eyes too, and sighed.

"This thing is to create lacrimas. You melt the ice and then soak other objects or something. Dunno," he answered with shagged shoulders and begrudgingly continued after her confused look. "Tsk. Gustav said that a three-quarter of the lacrimas of Fiore come from here, Daffodil Town, while the rest is imported, I think, so it's kinda very important since there's no other place like this in Fiore."

"Uh-uh," Juvia acknowledged. Then, after a long pause, spoke again, "What's a lacrima?"

He frowned. "How don't you _know_ what a―wait. How long were you there? In the ice."

She took a pensive pose, index finger on her lower-lip and all. She smiled uncertainly.

"Juvia doesn't know about lacrimas, so that long."

Gray rolled his eyes. "That explains a lot."

Juvia hummed noncommittally. Gray tapped his foot against the floor.

It was hard, he thought, not to be curious now. It had been hard then, with her blue hair and dark eyes and the endless stream of thoughts about demons; but now, when she looked so small, so human and so out of place, it was downright impossible. It made him grit his teeth and berate his mind. He shouldn't allow this.

He really, really shouldn't, he knew.

It was too late now, he also knew.

So. Gray waited. He was not very good at it, but he still waited.

"There were dragons in some short of war," Juvia began when enough time had passed for the silence to become awkward. "Back then when Juvia lived, she means. Something about humans and two sides. It's not like Juvia remembers much, her memories are blurry." She frowned and looked at him with a plea. "Evelina-sama told Juvia there aren't as many dragons nowadays."

The history classes of back when his parents were alive and Ur's nightly lesson surged forward.

"The Dragon Civil War." Gray whistled. "That's a long time ago."

Juvia opened her mouth, closed it again and then nervously played with her hands.

"That much?"

"Yeah." He nodded and Juvia winced. "Four hundred years or so."

"That's scary," she said, her gaze downcast. "Juvia doesn't feel like the time's passed at all."

Gray made a sound of agreement, his teeth biting down on his lip. Some part of him, the one Ur constantly admonished as the most selfish side, told him not to care. She was a monster and it was none of his concern. Watching her, though, so disheartened and sorrowful, she looked anything but. He couldn't keep up with the indifference he had showed her until now.

He just couldn't.

And it hit him then, with a kind of surprising awareness, that he was feeling sympathy for her. The one he couldn't shush and silence because he already knew exactly how it felt when your whole life changed drastically in one night.

It numbed him.

And, apparently, it made him stupid, too.

"I'll teach you what lacrimas are," he babbled, pointedly not looking at her. He'd regret it, later; not now. "I'll show all you wanna know. What you've missed and all that. I'll show you it all."

She looked at him all-hopeful and his heart might have skipped a beat.

"Really?"

"Really." Then, added, "I promise. But first we gotta work."

Juvia gifted him with one of the brightest smiles he had ever seen that, in turn, made him want to smile.

He didn't smile, though. Really. He didn't.

ooOOooOOoo

The kids of the town, for some reason, loved her. They must have considered her a new toy to play with, the parents all too happy to get rid of the children from their care, and Gray bitterly judged the villagers as naïve fools for letting that happen. They _still_ weren't listening to him.

Nonetheless, it didn't stop him from keeping a close eye on the bunch of midgets and Juvia as they played in the square of the village more times than he cared to admit.

"Noooo, Juvia," giggled the children, their four years old squeaky voice screeching, "that's not how a train works!"

"They do choo-choo sound and are like a worm! But made of metal!" another girl said. "And with smoke."

"Juvia understands," Juvia eagerly answered. "Trains are for traveling long distances, too, right? That's extremely handy."

"Yes!" all of the kids yelped at unison. "They're awesome. I rided one two weeks ago with momma!" one of the boys said.

"Show-off," Gray snorted through white teeth. Juvia kneeled his leg.

"Juvia's curious. How do they look like?" she continued without a beat. "Anna said it's like a worm, uh."

The water appeared from thin air before all the young, prying eyes. First, a shapeless blob before it transformed into a long, cylindrical figure between her dainty hands. The midgets 'ohhh'ed, jaws slack and their tiny bodies shifted closer to the show.

"Pretty magic!"

"That's _so_ cool."

"Now, now," hurried one at the back row, "they got big wheels!"

"And chimney at the front!"

"And lots of wagons!"

Juvia attempted to keep up with the new firing details, her water morphing as the descriptions got more specific. The kids closed the space into a thick circle around her until the figure might have taken a definite form.

Might, because, honestly, the final product resembled anything except for a train.

"Well," Gray drawled, his lips twisting, "ain't that beautiful. Worthy of a museum."

"Then do it yourself, meanie," called a blonde next to Juvia.

Gray scoffed, slightly aware that his shirt was missing, before he stood up with all the attention drawn to him. He could spot the impatient, rapt enthusiasm coming from the midgets around him, the secret smile plastered on Juvia, and, it occurred to him, he might have been played to showcase his ice powers.

That was a deflating notion, though, and wisely decided to believe he was more conscious than six years olds.

With a last shrug of his shoulder, the image came easily to the front of his mind. The fluent movements of his fist clashing created a chill in the air and frost spread from his fingers until a miniature, exact replica of a train appeared to everyone's amazement.

There were squeals and shouts, the kids holding the new toy with reverence. "That was _so_ awesome!"

Gray smirked at the praises, the only remaining seat in the bundle of dwarves next to a smiling Juvia, which, coincidentally, gave him the option of poking her.

"See," he mocked. "Way better than your monster."

She blushed. Gray laughed at her offended expression. His smirk only widened as he watched her huffing, the children around them in their own world.

"It's not that funny," she reprimanded.

"But it was," he answered, haughty. "Have you given it a good look? Thing looks like one of those modern art thingies that seem to have been stepped on. Very ugly."

She pouted.

He laughed harder.

ooOOooOOoo

The bell chimed as the door closed behind him, the warm interior of the improvised pharmacy run by the town's doctor greeting him. The familiar lines of medicament and plants blended with the wood furnishings, the counter painstakingly cleaned and Gray came face to face with the girl he knew all too well but didn't expect at the other side.

Gray stepped back before stepping forward. And smirked.

"Doc's sick?"

Juvia waved, usual dreamy smile plastered as she balanced herself on the chair. "Evelina-sama went to the neighboring town. Problems with a flu case," she explained brightly. "Which means Juvia'll be the one at your service today!"

Gray grumbled, his eyes narrowing as he took in the possibility of coming back later. Or tomorrow. He didn't trust Juvia had the credentials to work as an apothecary.

Yet again, he shouldn't have been working in the mines either.

"Gustav wants something for the stomach," he said at last, hands deep in the pocket of his new jacket. "He's said it's probably for something on the food."

"Aha! Juvia understands." She took out a piece of paper, skipped through it until she found whatever she wanted and hopped to one of the shelves, seizing one of the boxes there. "Here it is! Cook the roots and then eat them. Going by Evelina-sama's notes, it should be enough to heal it."

"Got it." Gray nodded. Then, he read the envelopment, looked up to find a friendly face and stuttered, "But isn't this a dose for two?"

Her eyes wrinkled.

"Yes," Juvia answered."Juvia thought since both Gustav-san and Gray-san, possibly, had the same meal, it'd best to prevent."

Gray gawked. "Oh." Then flushed red. "Uh, thanks. That's…thanks."

"Gray-kun's welcome."

It was uncomfortable, for him at least, when her smile broadened. The clinging sound of exchanging jewels didn't ease anything, and, by the time he should have left the store, Gray could do nothing more than gaze at the package of dandelions in his hands.

Something inside him stirred, changed and settled the forever.

His sigh was long and shaky before he blurted out, "Name's Gray Fullbuster."

She blinked, her face blank.

"Juvia already knew that."

Gray scoffed.

"Duh, yes, of course," he stammered. "You gotta be deaf not to catch it from others. But it's _not_ the same, I've never―actually, y'know, correctly introduced myself. Till now. So. There."

He extended his hand awkwardly.

"I might've been wrong with you. And maybe, possibly, acted like an arse," he prowled on. "And I'm—I'm kinda sorry for that. Or something. I don't _know._ "

The awkward situation got worse the longer Juvia took to answer, his nerves standing on end. He readied to sprint out of the store with a sniff and a grumble, his arms already falling out of reach, when she muffled a squeal with wide, starry eyes.

Juvia Lockser took Gray Fullbuster's hand with both of hers and held onto it with strength that made him blush.

" _Yes,_ " she said with a smile that was too bright. "Juvia hopes we can be great friends, Gray-san. Juvia really hopes so."

Gray groaned, the heat ascending to his face, and shook her off.

"Hey," he grunted, still flushed. "Don't push it. I just _apologized_. I'm not promising _anything_ here."

"If Gray-san says so." She snickered. "And, Gray-san, you're missing your pants."

ooOOooOOoo

She bumped against him, the already small space between the containers reduced alarmingly. The loud counting at the other side of the street halted, making it too late to fix the situation, and Gray swore. Juvia quieted a chuckle.

"This is my hiding place," Gray grounded. "Get your own."

"It's big enough for both of us."

"I barely fit here!" he snarled. "If that brat finds us is totally your fault. You know what. If Ian finds us I'm _so_ taking you down before he reaches me."

" _So_ mean," Juvia tutted. "Juvia thought we were friends. And it's not Ian; the one counting now is Lian."

Laughter burst out some feet away from them, followed by an indignant yelp, and both of them watched as the first victim fell.

"They're _twins,_ who can tell the difference?" Gray whispered back once Lian, or whoever the boy was, walked off from their zone. "And there's no friendship in the battlefield, only the survival of the fittest."

Her brow wrinkled, eyes fixated in front of them before flickering back to him.

"Is that a new saying?" At his tilt, she frowned. "That's so shabby. Juvia doesn't like it. Who would believe that?"

Gray snorted. "Lyon does." Although Ur _did_ laugh and mock him once he said that.

Juvia stared. "Who?"

The words already took shape in his mind― _an idiot who thinks the world of himself,_ he's going to say, _but he's good to have snowball fights with, so he's isn't that bad—,_ but the sentence died as soon as it reached the tip of his tongue. He was reminded that it had been long since he thought of Lyon in that way, and much longer since he saw him, after Ur and Deliora and Ice Shell, when Lyon had screamed he hated him and that all was his fault.

Lyon'd had been right too. It made everything all the more painful.

He huffed.

"Someone I knew," Gray gritted, his insides lurching. "None of your business. It doesn't matter."

"Uhm…"

Juvia squirmed at his side, hands nervously toying with the hem of her thick dress. They could hear the kids running around, shouts and blames flying around with some close calls of being discovered.

Gray sniffled, shoulders shagging at the odd atmosphere, and prayed that all got better.

"Sorry," he muttered when the situation became asphyxiating. "I wasn't being fair."

She hummed. He frowned and for a moment pondered if he had crossed the limit of her patience this time around. It was a frightening idea, he discovered, the kind of frightening that made him squirm and search for more words just for her and froze him in the spot. It made him fear the worst.

That's it, until a spark of something passed through her black eyes framed by pretty lashes, and he feared even worse.

"Gray-kun," she purred with a mischievous quality that unnerved him, "think fast."

"What."

The next seconds she pushed him out of their hiding place, not forceful but enough to unbalance him, which landed with him on his butt and a smirking girl sticking her tongue out in his direction.

Gray stared.

"Found Gray!" Lian screamed.

He gasped.

"That's cheating!"

Juvia laughed, then, and got caught too.

ooOOooOOoo

Gustav exploded into a fit of laughter, deep and howling, and Gray might have thought that the man had one too many of the beers he liked to drink after every dinner. He had the leftover foam to back up his deduction in his beard, at the very least.

"Why are you laughing?" asked Gray, suspicious. "I just said we're going to the mountain. The kids want to and Juvia supports the idea."

Gustav let out a grave breath, wiping out the imaginary tears before smashing the glass besides the empty plate of their meal.

"Just three months ago, lad," he began impishly, "ye were still all ove' place mumblin' about demons and how dat girl was one."

Gray blushed.

"It's not like that," he mumbled. " _And_ I haven't completely discarded that she's a demon!"

"Sure you do, kiddo," said Gustav, sarcasm dripping from his voice. "S'kay. Whateve' ye say. Have a good time and don't go near the forest. Wolfs an' bears're common around this time."

ooOOooOOoo

It _just_ happened in the same way mountains just crumbled down.

They were hiking close enough from the town that they still could see it, but far enough for wild animals to attack, which was what happened, exactly, when they midgets were happy and thrilled before everything went to hell.

The rest had been a blur―something about him summoning his magic, a scream from one of the boys where he could not reach and then…

Gray still could sense the humidity in the air, although the wild beasts drowned to death at her side were more ominous than the electrified feeling that had remained after her outburst. The screams from the kids, now far away from them and their games, added to the dread pooling at the pit of his stomach, too.

The scales, though, cobalt and aquamarine and light greens and all so very pretty, were the sole focus of his attention; and for the life of him Gray couldn't prey his eyes from them.

It was staggering how those kaleidoscopes of blue embraced her legs and arms, even her face to an extent, as if they _belonged_ there. They made her a monster, of all things, and it downed to him, with a clarity he had seemingly lacked for a while, that those scales made her what she actually was and not the ten years old human she had tried to look like.

And he watched how she didn't move or look at him or say a thing―and he didn't know what to do just then.

"You're a demon," was the first thing coming out from his mouth. "I was right."

She― _Juvia,_ he reminded himself with an urge he couldn't quite place― flinched, but didn't say a word yet. She didn't even try to defend from what was happening.

"I was right when I helped the villagers freeing you. I was right when I warned them that that kind of ice prison for an ordinary _girl_ wasn't normal," Gray spouted. "I was right when I didn't believe you even though you kept insisting you were as any other and when I accused you and _when I decided to trust you_."

Juvia blinked, even that being closer to reptilians than humans, and with a slow twitch her lips formed a poignant smile. He frowned. Why was she smiling? Why was she covered in unnatural blues and why did she have her hands webbed?

Why was this happening, now of all time, and with her of all people? Only _her_?

His breath hitched. There were fins pronouncing along her forearm, the same color of her cerulean hair, as well as where her ears should have been. Gills, too, just in the crook of her throat and shoulders

The meaning of it all finally downed and it shook him to the core.

"You are a _demon,_ " he breathed out. "I was _right._ "

Still, discovering she was a monster, why did he only feel like crying?

"Yes," she said with a low, broken voice, and it weirded him out as much as her new form did. "Juvia's sorry."

Her words hung heavy while Gray still kept watching, mildly fascinated and mildly aghast, how her scales retreated, leaving the girl he had known behind.

It was― all this, it was so, _so_ ―

His face contorted into something miserable.

He might have started crying. Juvia might have, too.

"We gotta go back," Gray said after a long, awkward silence. He sounded a mile away from there and then, and his sight blurred. "Lets the kids hurt themselves now."

Juvia only started walking.

ooOOooOOoo

Her sobs were loud and snotty and heartbreaking, and Gray felt his heart throb for the girl that had come to become part of his life.

They had been quiet for the most part, some unspoken agreement weighting them down to not speak, or do, absolutely anything until they reached home. Or never. Never would have been the ideal.

But that silence cracked, her tears and sobs rupturing the air, for fear or sadness or something entirely different Gray didn't know or wished to, and it took all his might to keep on walking. Caught between reacting now or later, he decided on the cowardly option and chose the latter.

It didn't last, however, because Juvia was still Juvia and Gray was still Gray, and, demon or girl, she was still something to him—something sad and ugly and beautiful all in one.

"C'mon, don't stall. It's only gonna get worse if you put it off," he mumbled, brow furrowed and lips curled down.

Her breath quivered, hands whipping out the tears from her red cheeks while she stood up in wobbly legs.

"Juvia knows. She's sorry about―this," the _and about what happened back there and everything else_ went unsaid.

"Whatever. It's not like you―you… I…" The words died as soon as they poured and Gray came to the sudden, dreadful conclusion that he didn't have anything to say when, in fact, he should have.

"Juvia understands if Gray-kun and Evelina-sama and the others hate her," Juvia said, her dress dirty and face stained, and Gray, for whatever reason, didn't like that. "Juvia only wants to say she's sorry. _Juvia's sorry._ If you want to… to do whatever you want to with her, Juvia _understands_. But Juvia's really sorry."

His stomach coiled at the hesitation, his mind filling in the missing gaps. Gray didn't want to ponder about that, though, not yet anyway, and buried the thoughts with a huff, his gaze anywhere but on her.

"Yeah. They will probably want to do something 'bout this," he stated, his voice thick. "What made you think you could get away with- with _that_? I don't _understand_."

Her smile was a tiny, weak thing. "Juvia thinks she was doing fairly well hiding it."

"You were," Gray affirmed with the faintest humor even as forceful as it was. "Even I's fooled and I was the most paranoid one."

She snorted. He went very still and watched her watch him.

"Gray-kun's taking this better than Juvia'd expected," she said quietly.

"I am. Yeah. I don't know why," he said. "You're demon and I'm not―I thought I would be but I'm not. I'm _not,"_ spat Gray. His scowl darkened. _"_ Why? Why did you pass as a human? Was there any damn reason for that? I want to know! I deserve it, so you better answer!"

The world was a blurry chaos, all sense lost at once, and the only remnant was her face in front of him, contorted into a bewildered expression with wide, pretty eyes. It anchored him.

It was maddening.

Juvia quivered, shrugged and looked somewhere behind him.

"Friends and people," she uttered. "And you were all so kind, and Juvia liked it so she waited, and then it was too late to say anything and― Juvia didn't want to lose that." She said it slowly, between afraid and desperate, and Gray noted her hand searching for his. "Juvia's never had friends. It was nice. She didn't know it was that nice."

"Ah."

Friends.

Friends, she had said. She had wanted _friends._

Demons _didn't_ want that. They wanted to destroy and trample and take away as much as they could. Deliora even did that, too, as carelessly as one would swat a fly away. Demons didn't save children from wild animals, neither, and Juvia just did that even if it meant uncovering her secret.

And Juvia was a demon, wasn't she?

Gray swallowed.

Even with his vision going fuzzy, he saw her hand enveloping his.

It was surprisingly warm.

"This is so _wrong,_ " he muttered as she squeezed.

"Juvia guesses it is."

Her words and the truth and what he knew once upon a time and what he had discovered―all of it was maddening. It almost drowned him much like the animals' fate behind them, because she was a demon and some part of him hated her like he hated Deliora and every other might-be demons. He hated her with all the intensity and abhorrence there was.

Yet, she was still Juvia. Happy Juvia, who always shrugged off his badmouth and continuously asked about this new world with wide eyes and pestered him to death until he agreed to play hide-and-seek with the others.

That was the only truth he was sure about―and it swelled inside him, thrumming until his heart beat to its sound.

"It doesn't matter," he said, first slow and then firm. "I wouldn't let it, whatever, happen. You're one of Zeref's demon but it doesn't matter. I think. I don't know. Or it doesn't matter much, at least."

She gasped, his hand clutched hers and—and—

And it just was. Gray hoped and prayed to Ur that he was making the right decision for once.

"Really?" Juvia asked in disbelief.

"Really. I promise," Gray said, the words rolling out of his mouth so easily he could almost not believe it. "You're my friend. I _chose_ you as my friend." At her incredulous expression, he reaffirmed it again, "You are. You're still a demon but I already chose. _So_. I can't let another one― even though you're one." His chest constricted as he noticed her crying again. "Just… just don't do that, what you did back there, again. Please. _Please._ "

It was truly maddening.

But—

"Okay," she said with a voice so tiny and still so hopeful. "Juvia promises."

Then, Juvia smiled, although still watery, the kind that he had seen countless of times, and Gray smiled with her.

He got this.


	2. Through the Years I

_Through the Years I_

Juvia wasn't surprised when the townsfolk welcomed her with cold, wary glances and loud whispers, parents hiding their children and Evelina frowning at her. She wasn't surprised when they asked her to leave, either, fearful of what could happen to them because of her by her own hands or by someone from the higher spheres. She could understand that―she had _expected_ it _._

It didn't quell the burning sensation, the itch at their disdainful thoughts or the sting on her chest, but it, somehow, helped.

She was surprised, though, when they apologized with soft words and lowered gazes. Evelina had readied for her a backpack with food and resources, even some jewels from the already low income Juvia knew the elderly doctor had, and sat her down for their last dinner together.

"They're afraid. Demons are―not legends, I guess, but the stories we know are enough to suspect the worse. All about ol' dark mage Zeref and everythin' else that comes with it. People're afraid of that." She had looked up, then, a confident smirk in place. "Me too. However, you're welcome to come back any time."

Juvia had spluttered at that, not expecting the invitation and stuttered with no logical sentence or meaning.

"Don't look shocked," the doctor chastised. "It's not like we don't _like_ you. In a better world, you'd have been taken care of and become another of our neighbors. It isn't. So for the moment take it as our only present."

The morning after, even though nearing summer, was chilly coated with a thin fog.

Juvia was surprised again when Gray, cold Gray who had hated her at first for all the right reasons, leant against the signs in the outskirts of the town. He waved, his sleepy face flushed, and grumbled under his breath.

"It's not what _you_ think," he began. "I just stayed here temporarily 'cuz of you and don't smile like _that,_ already had enough with Gustav's grins and 'yer a fool, lad' and always wanted to leave to―to somewhere. I dunno," Gray stammered, his hands grabbing the straps of his pack. "Anyway, if I'm traveling alone and you're traveling alone and we could travel together instead to make it easier and―"

Juvia squealed, face maybe a bit too close from his, and felt like hugging him.

"Yes," she yelled. "Yes, yes, yes!"

Next she did hug him, griping him like her life depended on it.

"Don't h― _stop it,_ " Gray protested between gasps of air. "I get it, I get it!"

Juvia unwrapped only after a final squeeze, her back straighter when standing as Gray cleaned his pants from the imaginary dust, all the while huffing as well as muttering, and she looked expectant for what was to come.

This, her new life in that strange, same world, could have been better; then again, it could have been worse―much worse, with no friend at her side and no place to return to.

"Where now?" she asked as happy as she felt.

"Does it matter?"

She beamed. "Juvia always wanted to see the sea."

Gray sighed. "South it is."

ooOOooOOoo

Fiore had changed. That much was clear in the numerous towns and cities along the road; less wild and more civilized, with new technology she'd only heard of from the few description people had given her. She didn't have much to compare with in the first place, her memories from centuries ago not all right there, and even then she, or Zeref-sama more specifically, had avoided any human installments like the plague. But the sensation was obvious with an once-over.

The roads were paved, the travelers with no fear and the first village they visited surrounded by a healthy forest and an energetic market open to the newcomers, a sharp contrast of her quaint life back in Daffodil Town.

It was _fascinating._

"Where are we?" Juvia asked, wide eyes inspecting one of the magical object in display.

"Some village who knows where." Gray clenched the map, scanning for the exact spot they had landed in and shrugged when he didn't found anything of help. "Hope there isn't a guild around at least. That'd make it easier to find a job for us."

She twirled around. "Guild?"

"What." He blinked owlishly and nose wrinkled until it downed to him. "Oh, yeah. Guilds are, uhm, mages who create a group and work for jewels doing missions that people ask to them. Kind of. That's the gist." He scratched at his nape. "They're to make things easier and safer for the mages and customers, I think."

Juvia poked her head over his shoulder, peeking over the map and her brow furrowed when she noticed Gray was on the process of taking his shirt away.

"Like a Circle then," she said, followed by an explanation when she noticed his confused frown. "Although instead of doing magical research it's for doing odd-jobs."

Gray nodded. "That's close enough."

She smiled, the animated ambient affecting her mood. She didn't recall people being so open to strangers, neither, although the apparent safety there might have helped it. Absently, Juvia wondered if the creation of those guilds had anything to do with it and looked at Gray, who was muttering under his breath about logging and where to find food.

"Why don't we join one?" she inquired. "Gray-kun wouldn't need to worry as much."

He froze on the spot, his mouth half-open as his head turned around before closing the gap between them.

"I thought you were one of Zeref's demons," he whispered.

"Juvia is."

Gray gulped, avoided her eyes and kicked a pebble.

"You know that Zeref's known as _the_ Dark Mage, right?" he grumbled, appalled. "He's not liked. Everything he created is destroyed or kept an eye on. Guilds are under the watch of the Magic Council and if they ever hear about you―you'd be―they'd―"

His warning sunk, slowly, and Juvia sighed. She had hoped that it wasn't the case even though the chances were minimal. She had listened into sufficient conversations to deduce that, even after all the time that had passed, the remaining fear for Zeref-sama still circulated between hushes and warning tales.

With a wince and a shake, her shoulder shagged.

"Oh," she breathed out. "Juvia's sorry."

Gray grunted, his attention back to the stands where vendors trapped costumers and pointed one woman at the very end o f the line that seemed short of helping hands. He tugged on her hand, his eyes flickering to her with each step they approached their destination, before something gave in and he pouted.

"Feh. We don't need a guild," Gray declared, chest puffed out. "I already traveled alone before, well, before you. How harder it can be with you? So let's do this."

Her lids fluttered, once, twice, before her face bloomed into a full smile and she trotted next to him.

"Right," she chirped and then added with a mischievous smirk, "Juvia's really happy Gray-kun is with her."

He blushed and she couldn't be gladder.

ooOOooOOoo

"Juvia, we're saving jewels. Starting right now," Gray grounded out as he slapped another leaf away. "We have to."

Juvia looked up from the map she had been carrying, an odd look crossing her, before she caught what he had said.

"Saving?"

"Yes," he continued. "It's taking us _forever_ to reach the coast. The trains are goddam expensive for us. Walking is stupid. This forest's stupid. So we're saving for our personal transport." He smashed his hands, freezing a path before them. "Like the one we saw on the market."

Her forehead scrunched in thought, her mind flying back to the exposition so as to find what her partner was talking about, all the while careful not to step on a overgrown root or clash against a low branch. If memory didn't betray her, which it did more times than she dared to count, there had been the usual, or what she thought was the usual, vehicles of four wheels―energized by a system she didn't quite understand but trusted was pulled thanks to magic.

Juvia doubted they could use those yet, something on how the seller shushed them away as soon as they approached those things. There had been, however, that stand next to the carts with animals as huge as an adult―rabbits and wolfs and even a tiger, or they resemble those at least.

Juvia giggled.

"Gray wants the panther, doesn't he?"

Gray huffed.

"The leopard's cooler."

ooOOooOOoo

The sea expanded beyond their sight, blue and crystalline and shining, the sight awe-inspiring whit the sun up and the harbor with pirates and sailors equally active. She had heeded stories about this. Zeref-sama have told her them when she had asked and then she would dream of traveling beyond the desert and the ruins she had come to known while he watched amused at her excitement and then― then―

"It's beautiful. Juvia never imagined it'd be like this."

"You're a water mage." Gray scowled. "Of course you'll like it, your element and all that jazz."

Juvia flinched at his dry tone. Maybe it had been because of the longer than expected trip to reach the seaside; the days drawn out with extended missions for each stop they made and, although a necessity, tiresome in their own right. Alternatively, it might have been for the people who glanced at their way, suspicious peeks all of them with anger behind dark glints, and Juvia pondered if they should stay there any longer.

Both options were disheartening, the moment ruined with his grumpiness adorable it may have been, and Juvia gave one last longing stare to the sea, hoping they would enjoy what activities she had heard of from the tourist they had crossed paths with, before turning around and facing Gray.

"Juvia was just saying," she pouted. "Gray-kun's been acting weird these last days. It's something wrong?"

He chewed on his lip, sight set on the landscape in front of them as his jacket sliced off from his arms and Juvia made a mental note of picking it up as soon as it dropped.

"No, it's nothing," said Gray. "Don't worry."

"Then there's something going on," Juvia answered.

His nose wrinkled while he let out an exasperated snort. "I told you there wasn't."

"You told Juvia it was nothing and not to worry," she pointed out. "It's different."

" _How?_ " Gray cocked an eyebrow. "It means the same thing."

"Nuh-uh."

His scowl deepened. "That doesn't make sense."

Juvia leant forward as he stepped back from her. She narrowed her eyes, hands clenched behind as Gray copied her motion.

"Juvia still thinks there's something you aren't telling."

"Humph," huffed Gray.

Her lips curled, the strained silence putting a damper and she had to open and close her mouth many times before finding the words she wanted to blurt out. Juvia swayed from one foot to another, her eyebrows knotted together, and exhaled.

"Will you tell Juvia?" she asked quietly.

Gray growled, a glare in place, and then sneered.

"Will you tell me about why you where imprisoned and Zeref and everything else you've kept quiet? No?" he snarled. "Wonder why, ah? Maybe Juvia should learn how to not be snotty 'coz makes people hella uncomfortable and I don't wanna tell you and―"

"―Gray-kun isn't proud of it," Juvia barged in. "Or maybe because Gray-kund doesn't trust Juvia enough."

The words wilted, his lips a thin, white line as he sniffed gruffly. Juvia wriggled, her feet dragging on the floor as she pondered if she had pushed her boundaries. She could sense her magic, whirling and coiling inside her, flaring awake against her wishes. And not long before the sky began to obscure with ugly looking clouds.

Juvia fisted her fingers, arms gluing to her sides as she fought back the tears and the rain when Gray squinted to the darkness above them and rustled, exhausted.

She sniffled.

"You aren't crying, are you?" he asked with a slight tremble to the pitch of his voice. She didn't answer straight away, which made him squirm, hands rising with nervous movements. "Look, it's just a bad date, a _really_ bad date, and we've travelling for a month plus something and I'm tired and probably you're tired too, it's been that _long,_ so let's forget this mess and find an inn, 'kay?"

She nodded slowly, bringing out a sigh from him.

"Don't worry," he repeated.

"Juvia's sorry," she snuffled. "She didn't think."

Gray grumbled some more at the same time he started to walk towards the town at their back before stopping and swirling around to face her. He didn't look ahead, attention focused on his feet, but Juvia's heart throbbed regardless.

"Yeah, I'm sorry too."

ooOOooOOoo

They had been lucky when summer turned out be hotter than expected, drying the water reserves and parching the earth, and more so when an old couple hired them for the whole summer and part of autumn to work on their farm. They hadn't been as lucky with the couple's personality, matching the definition of irritable, bad-tempered and unreasonable to a tee, and as the blob of water in midair quivered, drops falling, Juvia had to focus again on her task unless they wished to lose the job handed down to them.

"Watch out. You don't wanna overwater the seeds," Gray called out as he buried the hoe into the ground.

"Juvia'll be more careful," she fretted, her water spaying on the soil with meticulous precision. "But you didn't tell Juvia. That's _so_ ―Juvia feels wounded!"

He raised the hoe again, ready to strike it down, and arched a brow on her direction. "About?"

"Your birthday is in November!" she shrilled, dismayed.

"Yeah, what of it?" he drawled. "It's not like you memorized, dunno, doc's or Gustav's back in the town."

"Juvia _does_ know theirs," Juvia huffed, glancing over their supervisor working on the land just some meters away without minding them. "Except yours! Juvia didn't know! We didn't celebrate back then."

The hoe smacked the ground and Gray rolled his eyes.

"You're getting too wound up for that," he guffawed. "It's just a birthday and it's not like I was―we were on good terms then."

A cough resonated in the scorching day, attracting their mind to the elder man who swept a stinky eye in their direction before returning to check the vegetables. She flinched, with an ashamed blush creping when she looped around to face the rest of the dry plantation. They continued without a hitch for awhile, the only sound that of water and clash of rocks reverberating in the place as well as Gray's labored breath as the background noise.

She summoned her magic once more to continue with the task.

"But it is," said Juvia after a minute passed, her concentration centered on the dried plants.

"Wha?" Gray mouthed.

"It _is_ important," she pressed on, her voice no above a whisper. "Not for Gray-kun, maybe, but it is for Juvia. She wants to congratulate you properly. Because Gray-kun's one of the most important persons for Juvia right now!" She stared down on him. "And that's reason enough."

Juvia beamed, her insides giddy as she bumped her hand for extra emphasis. She saw, with a good amount of amusement, how Gray's eyes widened, mouth slack and his face, and torso now that she noticed his lack of garments, dyed with a vivid red that something told her wasn't entirely for the heat.

He avoided her and she inclined closer to him.

"Uhm…"

"Hey, brats!" an old voice cut through. "Stop chit-chatting and get on your damn job!"

They twirled around to face the wrath of their boss, who just turned around muttering under his breath something that might have sounded like 'useless little monsters', and Juvia deflated.

Gray growled next to her, with a cold glare and a vice-grip.

"Gray-kun, don't." She placed a hand on his arm and he scowled.

"He can't keep using us like this. When we're off from this nightmare, I'm giving that old geezer a piece of my mind." He hung the hoe above his head for a second longer than necessary before smacking it down. "And a frozen house."

ooOOooOOoo

Juvia swayed her way closer to Gray, hand firmly grabbing on his shoulder just in case his strength gave in, while she worriedly casted a look over the gash around his forehead. Her dress dripped onto the floor, shivers running up and down while her body cramped with stain, and her jaw clicked shut.

"What happened to you two?" asked the woman at the other side of the bar. "Wildness, a stormy night, a―?"

"Bandits," Gray grunted, his eyes unfocused. "On the way here."

The owner of the inn called _Anna's_ _Hole_ , built somewhere on a town named Onibas, reclined her head on her right hand, scrutinizing them as she made a bored 'ohh' sound that put Juvia on edge. Gray's increasing weight at her side didn't ease the situation, and she urged him to stay conscious for a little longer with a nudge.

"Hmmm…and you wanna stay the night, right?" the host, who was, Juvia guessed, probably Anna, slurred, drumming against the wooden counter.

"We can pay," she chirmed in when her companion took too long to answer. "And if it's not enough Juvia'll help around, ma'am."

The woman smirked. "That's what I wanted to hear." She walked out from behind the counter with keys at hand. "Follow me."

The ride to their room was slow, with Gray slumped against her, and then the staircase became a nightmare. Juvia wondered, with alarms going off, if the hit to the head had been worse than what they considered at first. It didn't bleed anymore, the superficial wound already taken care of, but the dark circles under Gray's eyes and the hunched way he hold himself, so unlike the usual firm and conceited posture, didn't relieve any of her worries.

What if she had reached him too late, or if they poisoned him somehow, or if he suffered from one of those contucious she had heard about. Or what if―?

"It's not something to fuss over," said Anna with an amused twitch of lips. "The gal's all right. Looks like magic exhaustion only."

Juvia backtracked, her breath hitching. "How―?"

" _Please,_ as if two normal, powerless kids'd survive a fight with bandits," she snorted. " 'sides, my tavern gathers mages from all places and I'm no fool," she explained airily. "But you're really lucky."

Juvia twisted under Gray's weight, a frown appeared on her face before asking, "What does Anna-san mean?"

"There been problems a short while ago with a near cult who tried to resurrect the dark mage Zeref or something. The Council and all came to wipe them out. Some of the members got out, though, and've been causing havoc lately." The woman shrugged with a forlorn expression. "If you're gonna travel these roads, go with the merchants. It's not good for two kids to go around alone."

Juvia hesitated on her next step, her hold trembling as she took the new information in with belated breath and stomach lurching. Her voice died, fingers clutching at Gray's side and she even stopped walking for a moment, the corridor expanding before her. Her tongue tasted sour, lips turned pale and Juvia did not react until Gray pinched her with a shake of his head.

She exhaled.

"…thank you for the advice," Juvia said with a lowered gaze.

"S'nothing, girlie," Anna said, smiling, and opened a door to the left. "There you go, room nice and tidy. Take care. And I want you up at six. Sharp. You gotta pay back the stay."

Gray grumbled as she carried him to one of the twin beds, the door closed behind them. It was still afternoon, broad light shedding from the window and the hustle from bellow racketing, but it didn't dissuade her. The exercise got the best of them both and, by the time Juvia managed to lay him down, her body finally surrendered to tiredness.

She plunged against the mattress of her own bed, all clothes still on.

"Juvia's draiiiined," she moaned.

"Yeaaah. Tell me 'bout that," Juvia heard Gray murmur from his position, sleepy. "That went worse than expected."

She hummed in agreement. In a last attempt of ensuring that everything was okay, she brought the last straws of strengths out while asking:

"Is Gray-kun okay?" Juvia stood up from her place. "Does he feel okay? Anything you want or need? Maybe we should change the bandages―"

Gray groaned, removing the jacket with effortless practice before pushing her away again. She caught something akin to 'worrywart' blurting from his mouth, although, honestly, she couldn't bring herself to care after the day they had. In fact, the silence that followed was a welcomed change, Juvia thought, with only their lulled breathing breaking it.

It went on for minutes without end, to the point where her lids started to flutter close despite her mind's warnings not to, and only Gray's voice pulled her out from the soothed state.

"Juvia." When she didn't answer right away, he called again, "Juvia, you there?"

"Hmmh," she managed to answer.

Gray cleared his throat. "Did you, uh, transform at the end? When I was knocked out," he spouted, very still from his place on the bed. "Didn't get what was going at the last moment there."

There was a long, awkward silence where blood pounded on her ears, her senses all awake as his question silently echoed in the room. It had been, for all purposes, a curious question and not the accusations she'd feared. Except Juvia almost felt the hint of, not fear, which was something he _should_ have felt in reality because she had been enraged like never before and not truly in control of her own magic and then there was nothing except water and bodies laying around―but something thick swarming his words, and her muscles tensed.

It was nerve wrecking.

And she didn't want to be seen as what she knew she, in truth, was―never wished for that and―

"No," she lied, "Juvia didn't."

Gray sighed, his face not visible from her position, and her lips thinned.

"Okay," he said after a moment. "Anyway. Just really happy those guys weren't the cult or whatever that woman's spoken about. That'd have been nasty."

Juvia frowned, fingers playing with the hem of her dress. A noise of something shattering came from the lower floor, making her twitch on her spot until she gave up. Juvia sat up against the old, rusty headboard with a timorous question bubbling inside her, and then gazed at the badly painted wall.

She clenched the pillow closer.

"Why would anyone want to resurrect Zeref-sama?" she inquired, voice quiet.

"As if I know," snorted Gray, arms covering his face. "They're nutters, cultist and shit. And the one who want Zeref back much more."

Juvia giggled, stiffly. Gray twisted at her stance.

"No, no, no. Juvia doesn't mean it like that," she said, playing with one lock of her hair. "Gray-kun, what Juvia tried to say is that, well, Zeref-sama's _alive_. He is _immortal._ " Gray peered through his bangs. _"_ Zeref-sama cannot die. So, he can't be resurrected, neither."

There was a beat of disconcert, Gray abruptly lifting himself from the lying spot and Juvia watching, with sharp eyes, how his stoic expression changed into bewilderment. She presumed it was something she should have expected, and her heart pounded wildly as her feet sunk into the mattress, the pillow tightly held against her frame.

Gray stared, and she mirrored the motion.

"Really?" he grounded out. "Zeref's alive and not…dead?"

"Yes." She nodded and he slumped on the bed once more.

"That's something I really _didn't_ want to know."

She hummed, a smile forming at his petulant tone and loosened up while lying down. She turned her head so as to face him on the twin bed.

"Juvia thinks it doesn't matters," she said. "If Zeref-sama hadn't acted till now and kept himself on the hiding for this long, he won't start now."

He huffed.

"S'ppose is true," Gray conceded with an exhale, scraping at the gash. " _Still,_ though. It's worrying."

ooOOooOOoo

At some point, nearing winter's worst days, Gray had asked her: 'do you wanna go visit doc and the others?' with a far-off look and the usual thoughtful wrinkle on his brow.

"For the winter," he had said, "that way we won't worry―well, _you_ won't need to worry about the cold and things. And it's been long, the Winter Festivals are coming, so I thought―"

Juvia had said yes in a heartbeat even before he could end the sentence and then, they were off.

The calm town of Daffodil, it turned out, didn't vary in the slightest since the last time. Maybe it had one too many houses and the road renewed; everything else, however, remained exactly the same, from the mines to the houses, old and musty and covered with snow.

It was comforting, as was arriving to the old house she had lived in for months.

"You've grown," Evelina commented as soon as she opened the door to welcome her. "How old are you now? Nine to be ten?"

Juvia yelped in excitement, throwing herself to the doctor's legs and hugging her with abandon. She heard a soft laughter coming from the woman, a hand resting on her head as well as the slight nudging to push her inside the house.

"How have you been doin'?" Evelina asked, cleaning the kitchen's table from whatever she had been doing before. "Good, I hope. And where is the ice-boy? Gustav told me he went with ya."

She snorted at the last part and Juvia blinked.

"Gray-kun's visiting Gustav-san," she said, sitting down. "And yes! Juvia and Gray-kun a bunch of places since we left. Juvia learned a _lot_ , like how those guilds work and the new _inventions_ , there are so many of them Juvia doesn't know where to start! But―before that, can Juvia stay here?" she asked, hurried. "Just for a couple of days."

Evelina chuckled, patting her on the head.

"As long as you don't expect me to heal any wounds you got without paying. Have enough of that with the occasional rip-off travelers, thank you," she sneered. "Otherwise, I don't mind, though others might," she warned. "Be careful of that."

Juvia smiled with one side of her mouth, Evelina doing the same, and she rested against the chair.

"Thank you," she said truthfully. "Juvia hopes to see the winter festival, too."

The doctor rattled around the kitchen, taking out cups and a pitcher and some everyday snacks, before sitting facing her.

"You're welcome," said Evelina. "In any case, how did it go? Got any problems?"

"Only once," she confessed after a deep breath. "Juvia and Gray-kun were traveling around and they were attacked by bandits."

She looked down to the table and Evelina whistled.

"Nasty," commented Evelina.

She shrugged. "It wasn't much."

Juvia sipped her mug, feet hanging and coat heavy as the woman's assessment hung over her head with all its weight. She could, with a sort of dreadful realization, perceive that the doctor knew, somehow. It must have been the age and the experience, plus her reluctance or something entirely different what gave her away.

Much like Gray, maybe; but unlike him who just never questioned her, Evelina regarded her coolly before speaking up.

"Must be harsh for you," said the doctor, her face soft and voice softer still.

Here, Juvia frowned utterly confused.

"Uh?"

"Not bein' able to run from that," she repeated. "It must be hard for you, although seeing how you're holdin' up is something of awe."

Juvia blushed, squashing the worry growing at the pit of her stomach.

"It's all right. Juvia knows not to use it and she doesn't." At the doctor's pointed stare, she rectified, "Only when Juvia really, really needs to."

"Hmm," Evelina nodded. "So, tell me more of your adventures."

Juvia smiled, hesitant but relieved, drank from her glass and continued the story.

ooOOooOOoo

The night before they set off was a dark one, new moon and all, but not outrageously frosty for the season they were in. It had been a long day with the celebration of the solstice, the little town aflame with a few stands, bonfires and drunk people. Juvia amazed at the vivacity, dragging an unenthusiastic Gray along as she herself followed the kids they had once played with through the streets.

It had been elating how they seemed eager to show her whatever nook and corner they were familiar with, more so when the kids hauled her to one of the game stands and the past completely forgotten. Afterwards came the fireworks, where she did push Gray next to her for an earned spectacle despite his flustered grumbles.

"It's just fireworks, seriously, what's so amazing 'bout it?" he had said, although keeping track of the display with rapt attention.

Then, there was the usual cool down where some aimlessly wandered waiting for the pubs and bars to get on, and others, mostly parents and their children, went home.

Juvia stayed out on a bench, glancing over the folks walking before her and munching down on a sweet she had bought.

"You aren't gonna sleep?" asked Gray with a yawn, sitting next to her. "We shoulda wake up early."

"Evelina-sama said most people get sick around this hour, after the partying, so it'd better to avoid going to her home for awhile until it calmed down."

"Eh," he mused. "That sucks."

"Does not. It was worth it."

"That doesn't mean it's not a downer," argued Gray.

"Hmrph," Juvia huffed. "And why's Gray-kun here?"

"Gustav has the keys and he's somewhere around with his boyfriend or something," he informed. "Couldn't find him before, when running around like chickens with you."

Juvia cleaned the rest of sugar from her fingers with a napkin.

"Juvia could help Gray-kun search for him now."

Gray shuddered. "He's at the bar, probably. I'm not entering there."

He pointed an installment at the far corner from where they were. It seemed rowdy, to say the least, and they could see someone throwing up at the door.

"Yeah..." she mumbled. "Juvia understands."

There was a light silence after that, comfortable albeit the noise, and Juvia propped her head on his shoulder with a simulated stretch. Gray didn't take any of it, though, and shook her off with a threatening glower.

Juvia grinned impishly, and he flushed with a frown.

"So," Gray spoke up after muttering under his breath, "tomorrow, where do we go next?"

She pondered the question a bit before giving up.

"Juvia doesn't know."

"We could try for Crocus. It's the capitol," proposed Gray airily. "There gotta be plenty things to do there."

Juvia smiled at that, hands resting at her side.

"Juvia likes how that sounds."

She watched as Gray bobbed his head, his hands behind his neck as he leaned against the bench. The cold winter night began to stick its head out, some flurries descending, and Juvia gaped at it. She puffed out a blur of fog as Gray wriggled into a more relaxed position, and she wondered, only half concerned, if she would have to worry about scattered clothes again.

Then, loud enough to be intentioned but low enough that she might have misheard it, he said:

"Or we could search for Zeref."

Something stopped, wholly stopped, and she vaguely considered if it had been her heart. Her breathing system, too, seemed to shut down, until her blank vision detected Gray's serious gaze on her and time returned to its flow.

Juvia sensed blood cursing through her veins and the air filling her lungs before a quake tore through her.

"Wha― _what_ ," she stuttered, her fingers clutching on her dress. "Wh-why so sudden, Gray-kun―why _Zeref-sama_ ―"

"You always call him that," interrupted Gray. "Zeref-sama. You always call him that even with everything he's done."

She gawked, bewildered at his word. Juvia couldn't bring herself to speak with her mind blacking out like it was doing then.

Gray shuffled with his jacket, a scowl marring his faction and mouth tightly closed.

"It's just―I've thinking since you told me about, well, the Dark Mage still being alive," he said.

Juvia gulped, the knot undone at this. "Juvia still doesn't understand."

His nose scrunched. "I guessed you'd like to meet him or something _. Dunno_. Just say yes or no."

Juvia frowned, hands restless as she plucked a loose thread out. Her mouth curled down, a fast beating drumming against her ribcage while she considered his words carefully, although Juvia already _knew,_ and coiled when she noticed his intense stare.

She sighed, chewing on her bottom lip.

"It won't work," she uttered after a long time.

Gray's glare narrowed. "Why?"

Juvia grinned with one side of her mouth, in spite of the nervous wreck and the wish of quitting the prickly conversation as quickly as possible.

"Juvia thought Gray-kun didn't like prying," she pointed out.

He scoffed, aggravated.

"Look," he sniffled tartly, "I'd rather not face him, okay? He's the cause of what's wrong with… with everything: my parents and Ur and all those monster he created _― But_ ," Gray grinded out, cutting short whatever he had started to say with a shake, "if anyone told me there was the chance of my family being out there, alive, I'd take it and search."

Gray glared, cheeks red, brows furrowed, before standing up and kicking at the snow accumulated.

"So that's why I asked," he said.

He was looking at her, not entirely reproachful but forceful enough to draw a shaky sigh from her. Juvia still felt the defensive streak on her core, urging her not to say a thing for all Gray had become to her and in spite of his sullen expression.

Juvia avoided his gaze, at first, before something snapped and her hands writhed in front of her, her eyes lowered to her lap.

"It won't work," she said levelly, "because Zeref-sama was the one who sealed Juvia. And Juvia is―afraid, maybe. She… just doesn't feel like Juvia's ready to face Zeref-sama."

Gray sat down again, a blank expression in place. "Ah," he mouthed, perplexed. "Any reason for the sealing?"

Juvia shrugged as she bent closer to him. "Juvia discovered something she shouldn't." At his lifted eyebrow, she explained further," Juvia tried to stop Zeref-sama, he got angry with Juvia and then she awoke here, with Gray-kun."

From her position, she could sense his chest contracting as if he was about to question further, but before Gray went through with it there was an exhalation. Juvia watched as he struggled with flickering glances directed at her and combed his hair.

"The more I know the less sense it makes," muttered Gray at the end. "No Zeref?"

She snorted. "Juvia'd rather _not_."

"Next Crocus, then." Gray nodded.

Juvia giggled at his exasperated groan as she settled against his shoulder, which he did nothing to shake off this time except for the disapproval shown by pursing his lips. Curling deeper into her coat and gazing at the pedestrians living off the last lingering festivities of the solstice unaware of them both, Juvia wondered back to the disconcerting conversation of a minute ago.

Her tongue darted out to wet her lips at the fresh memory of something specific he had said.

"So…"

Gray turned to face her. "So?"

"Was it one of Zeref-sama's demon?" she asked softly. "Was that the reason you didn't like Juvia at first? Because a demon made something to you before?"

Gray blinked, before his head wiped in her direction at her question and she shifted with him. He glared, his muscles tensing and jaw clenching as he regarded her with unfazed, cold eyes. Juvia didn't react, already expecting that response from him when Gray's dark scowl diminished a bit with a shudder.

She laughed slightly, spotting the discarded shirt at the same time Gray did, and she watched as his shoulders slumped with a sigh.

And she waited, patient.

"Yes," said Gray finally.

"If Gray-kun tells Juvia," offered Juvia with a flourish of her hand, "Juvia will answer Gray-kun's questions about anything he wants."

He sent her a withering look . "That's blackmailing."

"Only if Gray-kun wants," she rectified. "And it's a trade of information. Technically."

Gray sneered until a yielding, tiny smile tugged on his lips. Juvia smiled with him, as if they were accomplices of something bigger, and shyly elbowed him. He elbowed back.

"If you say so." He scratched at one of his cheeks. "It's a pretty long story."

"Juvia's is, too," Juvia said. "Which means Gray-kun and Juvia'll have to part in the afternoon instead of the morning."

Gray grouched, accompanied with a roll of eyes, while taking a more comfortable position and invited Juvia to join him.

"Remember in the harbor the first time we went to the sea?" he asked.

She thought about for a moment before motioning no.

"No…?"

"Your memory's _awful_ ," accused Gray.

Juvia pouted and he sniggered.

"It's not that bad," she said and Gray grunted with an astonished frown.

"After all the racquet you put up 'cuz of my birthday you didn't remember it," he said.

"But she gave you a present!" Juvia remarked. Then, deflated when Gray cocked a brow, amused. "Although three weeks late… It doesn't matter."

Gray huffed and her pout accentuated.

"S'kay. I made my point," he said with a nervous twitchy grin.

After that, Gray took a deep breath, the sort of one Juvia linked when someone was about to tell a long, sad story and she couldn't do anything else but scoot closer to hear better with an encouraging, sympathetic smile. Gray sighed, smiled weakly at her and cleared his throat.

Her turn would come later, and she prepared herself for that.

"Anyway," Gray began, looking far, far away, beyond the townspeople and the village and the world, "it was around that time when Deliora attacked my village―it was pretty much like Daffodil, but in the north, and…"

So it went.

* * *

 **Notes:** Here it is! Faster than I expected knowing I'm like a snail when writing and how I've been marathoning anime nonstop, which, btw, for those who like Adventure/Fantasy anime go watch _The Twelve Kingdoms_ RIGHT FUCKING NOW.

Anyway, next chapter will be after a timeskip and the last one before we kick in with the manga's arcs. I'm pretty excited about that rather than fearing it, strangely enough. Although I guess I'm gonna shit my pants once I start going through them. Plot, ew. But it'll take time because I gotta reread the manga from the start and-holy-shit-that-what-I-have-done.

As always, thanks for favorites and follows and the lovely reviews from Contrail, NudgeThePyro and loki,charms!


	3. Through the Years II

_Through the Years II_

Time passed.

And, despite what he originally imagined, travelling with a demon and trying to pass unobserved and undetected of the fact had been, against all his fears, unexpectedly easy―they just needed to keep a low profile while wandering from one place to another. There were problems, of course, such was the case of money with all the expenses for lodging and absurdly high prices of history books for a girl from a few centuries ago.

Regardless, with time, Gray discovered that Fiore had much more to offer than what he had ever dreamt at first. There were places and then there were its people, each different and each remarkable in their own right, and he learnt from that, which made Ur right when she pleaded to him and Lyon to find and discover to their hearts' contents―then again, Ur had been right about lots of things.

Juvia, on the other hand, discovered what she had missed, cheerful and hopeful as she always was, and Gray learnt to live with that, too. His decisions, after all, were his and only his, as Ur would have said, and he abided by them. Even when with all the almost instants where she would lose it and near breakdowns and all that should be feared haunting them, they marched on.

Juvia was good at that, and he picked up from her.

Years passed, and they grew.

And, well, if Gray was being honest with himself―

It wasn't half bad.

Most of the time anyway.

ooOOooOOoo

The bars rattled as the door to his cell opened, the gruff police officer awaiting for him with a run-down expression marring his features. Gray was not better to wear and, half-naked, stomped out from the confined space with his hands, not shoved deeply in his trouser's pockets as he would in any other occasion since he had none, but firmly clenched at his side.

"I hope," the policeman said while handing him his possessions, "I won't see you here again, Fullbuster."

Gray took his clothes and began dressing after making sure his pouch had everything it held before he'd been retained. "Yeah, yeah. I'm sorry," he grumbled out. "I'll be more careful next time."

The officer laughed brazenly. "You said that last time and look where you are now."

Gray sent a contemptuous glare over his shoulder.

"I'll try harder."

Once wholly geared, underwear and shirt and pants and even his journey cloak in place and then double checked just in case, the police escorted him to the counter so they could sign him out one last time and when at last free, Juvia welcomed him at the exit.

"You'd think that, after being in Onibas a thousand times, the police would learn that I'm _not_ a pervert with a―a _fetish of flashing around_ ," complained Gray as he read the charged accusations. "The fuck's this. How many times do I've to explain to bring the point across?"

Juvia giggled, exchanging with him a bag jam-packed with fast-food for the document. "Juvia thinks whether Gray-sama's a pervert or not is not what the officers worry about."

"Thanks, I was starving," he said munching on the hamburger. "And it's not like I strip on purpose. It just… sorta happens. There gotta be an exceptional rule for these kind of cases."

"Hmm," nodded Juvia while dusting off her wintry thick dress. "At any rate, it's becoming a real problem, Gray-sama. He should consider reigning over his most," here, she licked her lips as if pondering how to continue the sentence, "infamous habit before we are in real trouble."

He blinked, mouth full. "Whaddya mean?"

Grimacing, she passed him another file without a word, much like the one he had before; but instead of noting down the reasoning for his confinement, it dealt with the bail Juvia had to pay to free him. When his eyes landed on the specific amount of jewels his lips twisted into a sneer and he looked up to see how Juvia nodded at his silent question.

"Oh," choked Gray, gaze switching between the dark eyes and nefarious numbers. "Okay, yes. Totally toning down the stripping," he blurted out, lowering the hamburger. "Although they fucking raised the fee, didn't they? Last time it wasn't _this_ high. Assholes."

Juvia shrugged, an apologetic look grazing before she adjusted her backpack and waved a goodbye to the policeman as they began to stroll down the street. Gray muttered under his breath, paper crumbling under his annoyed grasp and the food quickly finished with a few bites. Gray noted, with some resignation, that they were heading to _Anna's Hole_ at the other side of Onibas. He glanced over Juvia, who was singing to herself, and scratched at his nape jadedly.

"What now?" he asked.

She looked back at him in confusion and smiled after his words registered. "Juvia doesn't mind if Gray-sama's goes naked when he's with Juvia in a non-public place," she said with flushed cheeks that to any other might have deemed as innocent. "She finds it exciting." Then, as her eyes narrowed, Juvia remarked, "As long as it's _only_ with Juvia."

Gray spluttered, almost stumbling over his own feet, and glared at her.

"I wasn't talking 'bout _that,_ crazy woman _,_ " he growled. _"_ I curse the day you found those stupid irksome romantic books. They've been messing with your brain since then."

In response, Juvia moped, clutching the strap of her bag tightly where he knew one of those dammed books resided, and Gray listened as she mumbled something too low for him to hear but guessed it went along the lines of the usual defensive arguments she used whenever he complaint about her choice of literature.

Gray grunted, not ready for the discussion after a night in prison, and diverted the conversation swiftly.

"Anyway, we have nothing, do we?" He watched as Juvia nodded with a hint of embarrassment and he run a hand through his hair. "Which means we need a new job."

Her shoulder's squared, an exact mirror of his movements, and casually caressed his arm in encouragement.

"Yes," she said, shyly smiling at him.

Gray kicked a pebble.

"Well, then. Better get over it now than later."

ooOOooOOoo

"Look who we have here," teased Anna from her position at the other side of the bar. "I hope you'll be able to keep your pants on, strip boy. We don't wanna call the cops again, right?"

She began to laugh, next, drawing the attention of the few customers around while Gray glowered at her. They beelined to the stools, Juvia quietly giggling behind him as the bartender scooted closer to attend them once they sat.

"We just arrived yesterday," Gray grumbled, "how in the hell did you know that?"

"When you're in charge of serving a bunch of drunkards who don't know how to keep information, and hands, to themselves, it's hard _not_ to know the newest gossips," Anna commented with a wrinkled nose. "Besides, with your record, it's an educated guess. And an easy one too."

Juvia took her hat and put it down on the counter, scoffing. "Anna-san does have a point on the last part," she said. "Gray-sama has a knack of being caught."

Gray huffed. "Not helping."

Anna winked at Juvia, wide smirk still in place, as Juvia concealed her own curled up lips from the view in a way that aggravated him.

"Listen to Juvia, Gray, she must know better than anyone," the barwoman snickered before straightening and archly asked, "So, the usual?"

Gray scoffed, hands tightly clutched onto the wood and far away from any clothes. He wasn't giving in on temptation after the mocking, and shook his head with conviction. Juvia sighed next to him, holding her pack closer to herself and shrugged at Anna's questioning gaze.

"Juvia and Gray-sama're here to see if Anna-san has any job to give," informed Juvia. "We'd appreciate it."

Gray nodded, arms crossed before his chest and glared at the men who eyed them back from their seats in the corner until they stopped doing so. Anna began to clean one of the glasses left behind and stared at them weirdly.

"There hasn't been much lately. The guilds around're taking care of every problem," she answered after a long time of dubitative silence.

Juvia's face fell, and Gray felt his mood dropping with it. "What a letdown."

Anna drummed her fingers, still with the glass in hand, and regarded them with a leveled gaze that didn't suppress the disappointed swarming inside them.

"You know, you two could always join one," she mentioned lightly. At their confused stare, Anna elaborated, "A guild. As far as I know, you both are talented enough to go for any you wish for. Even the grand ones like Fairy Tail or Lamia Scale'd accept you."

Gray made a choking sound at the last one. "Maybe not Lamia Scale."

"Eh," she blinked and searched for Juvia's help who only shook her head. Anna shrugged, then, and continued, "I'm not complaining either way. Your clients are pretty happy and they come to me for more requests, which brings more clients to my bar and I get a rise from it."

"You're using us," Gray jeered and shot a snide glare.

"And you me, kid," she sniped. "Symbiosis's a beautiful thing."

"So, there's no mission left?" Juvia chirmed in, grasping at his arm.

Anna tittered, index finger poking at Juvia, and that brought a tiny smile to them.

"I didn't say there wasn't _any_ right now," she mocked before her expression turned sour, "but it's painfully underpaid for what it asks."

"Like many others we did," Gray remarked and the woman arched a brow.

Juvia smiled bashfully. "Beggars can't be choosers."

"Which sucks," he finished. "Get on with it, Anna."

The barwoman exhaled noisily, and Gray could perceive his hair standing on an end when she took longer than she should to answer. Juvia wiggled as she got closer to the tight circle that was forming with everyone leaning in. He sighed in misery, and did the same.

"Thieves band," Anna said lastly. "The problem: they got a couple of mages among them so you should consider being more careful."

ooOOooOOoo

The hideout located somewhere between the roads connecting Onibas and Clover Town, deep in a forest within a cleaning and Gray wondered, with a scoff, what were those kind of people thinking when setting camp on an open field.

"Let's attack from each side," Juvia suggested, pointing two spaces with enough vegetation to act as a hiding spot.

Gray regarded the band steadily. "The mages're gonna be a hassle," he said, "so let's be careful and put down the mooks first, 'kay?"

Juvia nodded, her body leaning to the side, and Gray followed swiftly in the other direction with a confidence only acquired from years of working together.

It was like a well-practiced dance, with her stepping ahead and slicing the thieves with boiling water spurts before he acted freezing the water that had flooded the ground and thus their opponents with it. Gray watched as most of them were out of the game, encased in ice, and the only ones avoided the attack, who he supposed were the two mages of the band, stood before them.

The woman, tall and bulky, growled while her companion, a lanky man, bided his time behind her.

"Who are you?" the skinny man asked with a shrill voice. "Are you from a guild?"

"As if that matters," the woman growled.

"No," said Juvia, fighting pose still up. "But Juvia hopes we could end this quickly and without incidents."

Gray rolled his eyes at that, Juvia and her habit of asking before acting, and heard how the tall woman laughed hysterically.

"Good one," she said and launched herself against them with, Gray observed, smoke and heat radiating from her fists.

A fire mage, he realized with scorn.

"Shit."

He summoned an ice-hammer, Juvia fencing the attacks thanks to her water body, and, before anyone could see what was happening, slammed the weapon against their adversary's back with a cracking sound that made them cringe as Juvia blew out her fire with water. The thief didn't stay put, though, and growled at them.

"Suta, fucking _move,_ you useless man!" the woman snarled and her lanky companion squeaked, frightened.

"Juvia, lock her! I get rid of the man!" Gray yelled.

Before they could carry out anything, however, the earth grumbled and from it huge, dirty pillars emerged. Gray saw from his position on the ground after he had lost balance how the man who seemed to be an earth mage tripped down as well, and with a snarl, Gray rammed the earth, covering it with another layer of ice.

"Gray-sama―don't!"

He rolled around still without standing up to meet Juvia, who apparently had been fighting the other mage in her water form, iced over as the rest of the field. The fire woman grinned lavishly, throwing a well-timed fiery punch against Juvia's side and then stepped over her towards him.

"Shit shit shit," grumbled Gray as he created an ice-shield to prevent the first pounding, although it only lasted a few seconds, with the heat of the fire and the stupidly absurd strength of the woman hitting at full breaking it in matter of seconds.

"You seeked this, idiots," the woman cackled.

"Fuck you," said Gray and matched her physically, not ready to become a scorched corpse despite his hands would suffer from the fate.

It was even fight, his finger burning and sweat dangling from his skin, and Gray expected that only the one with most experience would win. Or so he thought, at least, until―

Well.

Until something broke, like a crackling and a zap of bristling magic, and then waves of water came in unstoppable torrents. Lots of it, as if a dam had broken, chilling them to the core and wanted to swallow everything whole.

"What," hissed someone behind them, "do you think you're _doing_ to _Gray-sama_?"

Gray barely avoided the magical wave coming their way, even though the bulky woman didn't have the same luck and was dragged along until crashing out against one of the earth pillars.

"What the _hell_ ―"

The female thief never had the chance of finishing whatever she was going to say and Gray saw how Juvia, now covered in blue and sea-greens and gills and fins and webs and all he marked as no human making her something that she shouldn't be, exploded into lashes of water whips against an enemy that had long been subdued.

Gray choked, Juvia growled guttural, and he gritted his teeth at the image that he wished not to see.

"Juvia, stop it! You won!" he commanded careful not to get too close. She had never done anything to him in the few times the situation had repeated, but he knew better than test his luck. "We're not here to kill them; only retain them! Juvia. Stop. _Now._ "

She didn't listen him, though, or couldn't, and continued in her onslaught with a ferocity that made him flinch. Gray watched, a dash of trepidation swelling inside him, as Juvia's Water Lock materialized around the woman as deathly as always.

There were bubbles, the woman losing her consciousness as she closed her eyes and even with that, Juvia didn't seem to want to stop.

Not like that―all scales and hatred and poisoned thoughts.

So he froze her before it was too late and sighed.

"God-fucking-dammit," Gray wheezed once he recovered, glaring at the snapping ice shaping Juvia. "Why does always something have to happen?"

ooOOooOOoo

Gray woke up with Juvia's face hovering above his, too close to be comfortable and lighted with, he guessed, the dim glow of the moon since the rest of the room remained dark. Years back, this scenario would have freaked him out―Juvia did develop some creepy habits here and there, after all, like going all demonic and stuff every time he got into trouble― and thrown himself out of the bed and into the furthest corner or spot he could reach.

Nevertheless, once the situation repeated so many times, the surprise was lost and he endured it as he would endure any other pseudo-normal situation. Even though that, the familiarity and normalcy of the action, worried him more.

He sighed, resigning himself to a glare.

And then Juvia poked him.

Gray's glare narrowed. "What are you doin'?"

"Juvia's checking," she said before sitting down on the bed despite his low warning. "Did Juvia cause a lot of troubles?"

Gray smacked one hand over his face to swipe the sleepiness away and regarded her with tired eyes.

"Yeah," he said and Juvia grimaced. "It coulda been worse, though."

She lowered her gaze, bandaged arms shaking and lips trembling.

"Juvia's sorry," she said.

"Nothin' to be sorry for," muttered Gray, wondering if he should stood up before dismissing the idea since it was late and he was tired and she resembled a mummy more than a person now and, honestly, couldn't the girl wait until morning to have the conversation? He huffed at the thought and resigned himself to ask, "You better?"

"Mmmh," Juvia nodded. "Juvia feels a bit cold still, but better."

She smiled, tilting towards him, which made Gray sigh in relief and watched as her expression changed into one of realization and stretched the collar of her nightgown that was already _too_ low for his taste. His face warmed instantly, turning around to face the window.

"And with a new scar," she chirped, releasing the garment.

He raised an eyebrow. "A scar?"

"The woman's fire hit Juvia's skin. It burnt." Her nose wrinkled. "And it's ugly."

"The doctor didn't say," drawled Gray.

"It's faint," she said. "Juvia only spotted it because the flesh's more tender there."

Gray scoffed sardonically. "Big deal then."

She gasped, smitten, and clasped her right hand against her chest with a hurt look grazing her. Gray flinched, her slacked jaw a certain giveaway of his seemingly lack of tact and tried to right the situation.

"Hey," he spluttered, "as long as your injuries are visible it's good."

Juvia eyes widened and, smirking, she asked, "Has Gray-sama being snooping around Juvia's novels?"

"The hell are you sayin'."

Juvia tilted her head knowingly and he glowered at her with twitching lips and curling hands. Gray turned his back at her, ignoring Juvia at the best of his abilities and attempted to regain his sleep despite her weight on the bed.

There was a moment of silence, where he almost achieved his goal, until Juvia decided it was a good idea to lay beside him.

"What are you doing? Get off now," Gray said while kicking her under the sheets.

She shrugged it off, looked at him square in the eye with a frown uncommon of her and said, "Does Gray-sama ever regret this?"

"This what?" he asked back with furrowed brow.

Juvia hesitated at first, the skin between her eyes puckering before she gestured with her hand, first herself and then the room, the backpacks, Fiore's maps on the nightstand and finally him. Gray watched her squirming, her question heavy as he blinked, and considered her words and her expression and the subtle way she tried not to look upset and wary and tiny.

Gray licked his lips, the question present in the forefront of his mind and never wavered his sight from her.

He could see it. How his life would have worked out, maybe, if he had never bothered to stop that single time. He would have marched west, probably joined a guild too, like Lyon had done, and lived off the rest of his life without _knowing_. He would have never met bubbly Juvia who always worried for him and would have never cared about demons, apart from his nightmares, or feared being found with one, or struggled with the problems of a nomad.

Or he could have been found dumped somewhere, dead, and that would have been it.

These were, however, somehow sad thoughts regardless of how he looked at it, and he scoffed at the question.

Juvia tensed besides him.

"Nah, don't think so," Gray said truthfully. "It's not like there's anything that can be done now, so it doesn't matter either way."

Juvia smiled, the motion slow with each registered word, and sighed wistfully as her eyes swarmed with something akin to reverence and longing and raw awe, and Gray waited with a dry throat for her reply.

"Juvia thinks she's in love with Gray-sama," Juvia stated finally, voice soft and her expression much softer.

Gray looked away, cheeks heating with a vivid red, and spluttered, "You already told me that."

"Well, it's true," Juvia pouted. "Juvia loves Gray-sama."

He exhaled and she watched.

"Now, get off," said Gray, face smudged with a new shade of red and pushing her again. "Hog the sheets if you wanna, but stay out."

Juvia laughed cheerfully, her hand resting on his chest.

"No until Gray-sama admits he's being reading Juvia's books," she said, and then added while watching his dark but still pink expression, "And Gray-sama doesn't look good when brooding."

"I don't brood!" he grunted. "And go to your bed already. I wanna sleep."

Juvia laughed once again, pecked him in the cheek, hopped to the twin bed with his sheets in hand and said as she tucked herself, "Gray-sama didn't deny whether he reads the books or not."

ooOOooOOoo

Gray stood in the middle of the plains, nodding at his new acquisition with an approving sign, and Juvia sighed incredulously.

"Juvia can't believe Gray-sama pulled this," she said as she stared at the enormous leopard-thing that was staring her back. "Juvia can't believe Gray-sama _managed_ to."

Gray sneered as he began to check the mounting equipment and making sure the saddle was safely placed the way the seller had shown him. He glanced over Juvia, who was very still with one hand hiding her mouth, and arched an eyebrow.

"Your dream's to read every-damn-one of those gag inducing romantic novels. Mine's to have a cool pet," he said. "I buy you the books and you allow me this. Win-win situation. Everyone's happy." Then, low enough not to be heard but that sounded like an actual sentence, he mumbled, "I even paid it from my portion of jewels. Took me forever with all the bailouts."

Gray noted how her mouth coiled upwards, motioning one of his own smile as he patted the beast who leant against his touch and was bigger than the common ones in the wild with a darker shade of fur that bizarrely faded away into white at its legs.

"Besides," added Gray after a moment, "no outrageous walking through days to no end. Think about that."

"Juvia thinks we handled it well so far," she pointed out.

Gray scoffed. "Now we don't have to handle it at all."

Juvia snickered, not really upset, and approached them both with a smile in place. He prompted her to get closer when she hesitated, the last preparations finished, and watched as Juvia rubbed the spot behind the beast's ear. The leopard purred under her touch.

"All right," she conceded finally, a soft look taking over. "As long as Juvia can cuddle as much as she wants."

Gray sniggered, climbing to the leopard and helped Juvia to do the same.

"What's her name?" Juvia wondered aloud as the animal started to move.

Gray glanced at Juvia, then the animal and back to Juvia with wide eyes. "Her?"

ooOOooOOoo

"Harujion's port has been destroyed," Juvia informed him one afternoon as they rode off to the next location. "Juvia thinks maybe we should go there, Gray-sama. They must be searching for workers to restore it."

He grumbled, his fingers clenching around the strap of their mount and gave a quick glance to Juvia who sat at the back before returning his sight to the path in front. Stamping themselves against a tree, after all, wouldn't do.

"Stop reading the newspaper while riding in Mittens!" chided Gray, the new name of their leopard rolling awkwardly on his tongue as he internally cursed the moment he let her decided the name. "Once of you throwing up on me is one too many times already."

Juvia didn't comply, the swish of paper still permanent behind him and her grip around his stomach tightening. "Although, Juvia thinks," she pondered, "maybe we shouldn't. The Magic Council is there inspecting the damage."

Mittens skipped through the debris of the forest at great speed and Gray made her slow down after perking up at that. "Why?"

"Fairy Tail," Juvia answered, and that was enough to draw a groan from him.

"Not them again," Gray snarled. "Why it's always them."

Juvia chuckled lightly, although he _knew_ she agreed with him, and Gray growled before she continued on.

" _Yesterday noon, the harbor of Harujion was torn down when a ship, which was later found to be a slavery ship, was hurled against the installments_ ," she read. " _It's believed that the culprit was one of the members of the renowned Fairy Tail guild, who had a long history of property destruction and disregard of the law._ Uhm, the article goes on for a bit longer after this."

There was a stunned silence as Juvia finished the paragraph, only broken by the soft rumbles coming from Mittens and her stride against the ground, and Gray found himself with his mouth agape and eyes narrowed.

"How," he drawled nonplussed, "do you _throw_ a _ship_ up against the forsaken _dock_?"

Juvia contemplated the question, her head falling on his shoulders to relieve the rocking, and Gray swore that, if the next thing she uttered was to please, stop, Juvia feels dizzy, he was dropping her right there.

"Juvia could do that, too," she said at last with a shrug.

Gray chose to overlook the comment and focused on the issue. "…so, we get going or not?"

Juvia stiffened, her body closing the gap between his before stammering, "But―the Council―"

Gray chortled, his mouth going dry in the process and Juvia peering over.

"They'll be there to gauge the loses and gone by the time we arrive there," he grumbled out. "It's not like it's been different the other times we faced something like this."

Juvia considered it, the observation rigging true, and nodded.

ooOOooOOoo

The lacrima buzzed with magic before a blurry image appeared and a static sound droned, the connection becoming clearer as he bumped some more energy into it. When it finally cleared out, though, Gustav greeted him and Gray waved lazily.

"Hey, old man," he said. "How's going there?"

"Stripper boy," Gustav smiled back and Gray frowned. "S'good. Same ol', same ol' with the kid and the husband. And as long as you ain't callin' for bailout money for public indecency it'll stay good."

Gray shut his jaw with mutinous click, eyes twitching as he looked back to find a distracted Juvia reading whatever she was reading to return to the call.

He leered. "What do you know?"

"What Juvia tells Evelina and Evelina tells me," the man shrugged with a hearty laugh. "It's always been like this, Gray. Nothin' unusual.

Gray huffed and glared dejectedly. "Don't you have anything better to do than gossip with the doc over us every time you go out for a nice, afternoon tea or what?"

"The world doesn't spin 'round ya, lad," Gustav reproached with a drawl.

" _Whatever._ The reason I called," Gray sighed. "Juvia and me aren't going there as said. Got a job and then we agreed to visit Onibas one more time before setting off. So don't expect us for a couple months."

Gustav harrumphed, hand stroking his beard as he watched Gray with his stoic expression and beetle eyes.

"Oh," he said, skin dotted with wrinkles. "A pity."

Gray sneered, smirk tugging on the corners his mouth and bended over to have a better view of the other side of the lacrima.

"What? Gonna miss us?" he peeped.

"Only 'coz yer ain't there to babysit the kid. Hardly missin' I'd say," Gustav replied cockily. " _But_ ―I got a whiff of a well-paid work fo' ye."

Gray puffed, his ears perking at that and he willed to steel himself at the new information.

"How much?" Gray questioned and huffed when Gustav only smirked. "C'mon!"

"Cool down, boy." Gustav rolled his eyes as he began to search for something on his own side of the connection. "Lemme look… around 4 000 000 jewels as reward."

Gray whistled. "Really?"

"Yeh."

Gray stared, his mind swirling at the mammoth quantity that were 4 000 000 jewels, more than what he and Juvia managed to make in months, and his muscles tensed at the sheer excitation of having the chance of getting that number in his hands. Gustav stared back, too, sniggering as only the old man could do, and Gray felt his own lupine smile widening.

"And what's the mission?" he asked hurriedly, not missing a beat. "We could go for it once we're done here."

Gustav inhaled, theatrically waving the mission paper before him and gave one last once-over before reading it.

"Says it's 'bout a curse on an island. Galuna's called," he said and Gray nodded at him to continue when he wavered. "Dat the curse's 'coz the moon and―well, uh. Strange. They ask to destroy the moon?"

Silence first, the kind that surfaced from disbelief and astonishment and utter bewilderment, and then―

"You're joking," jeered Gray.

Gustav tilted his head, nose crinkled and grunted, "It won't do."

"I don't think so, no," Gray said. It took him a second before catching his tone and sighed with a hand massaging his neck, resigned. "But thanks. For trying, I guess."

Gustav chuckled lightly and said, "Anytime, kiddo."

Gray protested under his breath, flustered, that no, he wasn't a kid anymore and he should have stopped calling him that long ago, and Gustav laughed even harder at him.

ooOOooOOoo

 _Anna's Hole_ was disrupted by a woman clad in armor and long, red hair who decided that bringing in a gigantic horn and a decade worth of luggage inside the bar was a good idea. She sat at the far table located in the corner, her posture as regal as anyone would expect from a knight, and waited with razor-sharp stare in their direction and a cocked eyebrow until one of the barmaids approached asking for her order.

Gray slurped the soup on a go, switching between staring at the redhead, Juvia's starry, adoring gaze and Anna's, who had considered it was best to annoy them, screwing up face.

"Oh, gods. Not _her_ again," Anna murmured with an unusual gloomy frown. "Once was enough of that woman beating up every single customer 'cuz she couldn't control her temper."

Gray decided, right away, that he liked the woman―whoever she was.

"Oh, but―but―she's Erza Scarlet-san," Juvia blabbered with a thrilled smile. "She's one of the best mages around!"

He sifted in his seat. "How do y'know that?"

"Juva might've read some magazines picturing her," she said flapping her hand to the sides. "Not much."

Gray watched how Juvia writhed under his gaze and came to the conclusion that he didn't really want to know, biting down on his tongue even before the question could take form. So, instead, he spun around to face Anna who was still sending daggers on Scarlet's direction.

"As if that matters. She's a hazard about to happen in my inn," she said gruffly. "Although I didn't take you as one of that woman's fangirls, Juvia. Thought you've better taste."

Juvia puffed her cheeks, aggravated, while Gray sniggered behind his glass full of beer and Anna watched them both with a malicious glint that knocked down his mood with suspicion.

"But seeing you with this idiot here," she droned, "maybe it's not that incredible."

This time around Gray was the one who bristled.

"None of your business," he bit back as Anna laughed.

"Juvia's _passionate,_ " Juvia protested. "There's nothing wrong with that. It just means that Juvia's more feelings oriented than others."

"That's what Gustav told you," Gray pointed out with a poignant look. "You shouldn't believe him on anything at all."

"Evelina-sama agreed," she noted.

Anna stifled a smile. "She got a point. Juvia _is_ passionate. In an obsessive kind of way."

Gray huffed, forehead puckered and chin on his palm. He opened his mouth ready to answer when a shout cut through the air with an imperious tone that startled them out of their banter.

"Where's my booze?!" someone bellowed two tables away, leering at the barmaid in charge. "Why are you so slow, woman?!"

Three heads twirled around to confront a group of men boisterously talking with each other. Gray grimaced, probably from a guild he thought, and returned to the conversation with a derisive scowl as he faced a frowning Juvia who was still looking at those people and a scornful Anna.

"Wow, you've the best customers, don't you?" he mocked at the latter.

"Don't tell me," she mumbled while standing up from her position. "I should get on with my job before everything goes to hell. See ya, lovebirds."

Gray sighed in peace at last without snooty people lingering close. "I don't stand that woman. She can't leave us alone for once at least?"

Juvia wasn't listening to him, however, pose stiff and piercing eyes set on somewhere else, and he jabbed at Juvia's side, disgruntled at her lack of care. She didn't budge, though, and before he could understand what was going on, Juvia smacked a hand over his mouth.

"What the heck―" She shushed him quiet, something she had never done, and Gray gaped at her while she yanked her head to the group of men who had interrupted them before.

Gray, not sure on what to do next with this Juvia and casting a dubious glare around them, squinted in the direction of the little group and listened on whatever that had grabbed Juvia's attention.

"―ligor-san know," one of those man was saying. "I'll definitely come back with the lullaby in a couple of days."

"For real?!" another of the thugs piped up. "Did you figure out how to break the seal?"

"Good job, Kage-chan!"

Gray turned to face Juvia still as confused as before and asked, "Juvia? What's going on?"

Juvia's features hardened, gaze following the retreating group that disappeared once the doors closed behind them. There was something, it appeared, that had escaped his compression but dug deeper than what he should expect since Juvia was so… _distraught_ by whatever that had taken place between the discussion. Gray wondered with a careful watch on Juvia's coiling hand if he should start worrying as much as she was evidently doing.

Idly, he noticed how that redhead woman, Erza Scarlet, stood up, threw some jewels in the counter and strode out as well, her outrageous belongings at hand.

And Juvia seemed all set to follow those shady people if he went by her stern expression and worried twist of lips.

"Juvia and Gray-sama must get going after them!" she exclaimed while nagging him out of his seat.

She pushed and shoved and pulled him out of the tavern, grip tight around his wrist to reach their mount on quick strides despite his questions and tugs. They didn't even stop to wave a goodbye to Anna or the staff, who had trailed their every movement with raised eyebrows. Wordlessly, once out, Juvia fondled and prepared Mittens for the ride.

Gray huffed, still in the dark, stomped his feet and grabbed Juvia from her arm.

"Wait, I said!" he grounded and Juvia stopped saddling their leopard at his burst, spinning around with a troubled expression that made Gray step back and inhale before continuing, "Why the rush all of a sudden? For all we know they're just mages working on a mission!"

She chewed down on her lip, eyes flickering to either side of the road before confronting him with a disquieting frown and, with a voice so grave and tiny that set off all the alarms on his head because Gray could only expect the worse from that, said:

"It's just―Juvia isn't sure but how they spoke about that think― _lullaby_ ― is," Juvia breathed out, distressed, "familiar. Awfully familiar."

He scowled. "How so?"

"Juvia thinks it's one of Zeref-sama's inventions," she whined at him. "It's not _safe_. At all. It's extremely dangerous if Juvia's right."

Gray groaned.

" _Gray-sama_ , we have to stop them before it's too late," she pressed with a pleading shine.

 _"Fuck,"_ he said.

* * *

 **Notes:** So, yeah, _finally._ It's turning out to be more of a challenge that I thought at the beginning. The fighting scene's me stepping on eggshells more than anything else, so if anyone has any propositions or criticism, please, do go ahead. I'll appreciate it.

And finally we got to canon, too! Now comes the scrutinizing chore of separating what I should write about canon or not, what to skip over and what scenes have to change. Jeez... But! For anyone who's interested, the arcs that I will cover (as for this moment, I may change my decision) are: Lullaby Arc, Galuna Island Arc, Tower of Heaven and Grimoire Heart. The first two arcs won't take more than one chapter each (I hope) and from the 7 years time skip on... weeeeellllll, I'm not really sure what to do with it to be honest. Ideas here and there, but nothing tangible.

All in due time, I guess.

Thank you for the favorites and followers, and specially the encouraging reviews from M, loki .charms, Guest, Drkooljack (whom I'm sorry to tell that, nope, Gray isn't getting Demon Slayer any time soon), Contrail, Merle the Great and dragonball256!

P.s. Next chapter might take longer since I won't be able to write shit for a week or so, although I'll try to bring another chapter before uni starts again. Key word: try.


	4. Lullaby

_Lullaby_

Gray bashed the door to their rented room open, the old wood creaking under his slam as he entered with a hunched posture and Juvia whipped around to find him about to throw his shirt, one of the last remaining clothes on him, to the corner.

"I did the _stupidest_ lap around the town just 'coz some guy told me to," Gray growled. "Whoever those Isenwall are―"

"Eisenwald," Juvia corrected lightly which was followed by an exasperated 'who cares'.

"―they gotta be a shady bunch if the folks around don't know or wanna talk about them," he finished and sat down on the only bed in the room with a gruff. "Or perhaps we're on the wrong town and pursuing the wrong people. Are you _sure_ they said the name of that dude―Eligor?"

She huffed and sprung from her place next to the window. "Juvia isn't deaf."

Gray stared, his arms relaxing at his sides with an assessing look marring his features. Juvia thought again of her outburst, bit down on her lip, the tip of her ears flashing red, and retreated to her seat meekly.

Gray sighed and walked towards her. "Alright. We don't have any other clues anyway," he said slowly. "No luck on your side?"

"Nope. And Juvia's tried to be subtle when asking."

She smiled puckishly when he scoffed.

"You don't do subtle, though. Ever," he drawled with a smirk. "You're the anti-subtle when comes to shit like this."

"Juvia can _try,_ " Juvia pressed while crossing her arms.

"Yeah, you can."

Gray leant against the window-frame, his gaze gracing over the streets of Kunugi below their room. Juvia did the same, her brow puckering as she wiped one of the loose tufts of her hair from her face and eyes locked in the few silhouettes against the darkening sky. The hurling sensation in her stomach that had been pestering her for three days still coiled inside her, the distress growing by the second as her mind swirled with all kind of possibilities and what ifs and awful visions.

Juvia heaved a deep breath, her sight never wavering from the night outside, and hands writhed on her lap.

"Juvia hopes Gray-sama and she can finish this without any incidents," she whispered with a petulance and aggressiveness of someone who had said the same sentence, word by word, many times before. "Those mages don't know what they're doing freeing Lullaby."

"Stupid people who want nothing good," Gray exhaled with the similar level of tiredness and scratched at his chin. "Say, s'true if one listens to that flute's music they're dead? I mean, seems a bit iffy so..."

"Juvia believes so, yes." Her lips curled downwards. "Although she isn't sure, Juvia's never actually seen―"

"―Lullaby on use and you only know 'coz you're a snooty woman who cannot no nose around the personal belongings of others. Even though it's the godamm Dark Mage Zeref's blueprints on demons," Gray grounded. "Heard that already."

She pouted, her eyes flickering shortly to him. "Gray-sama's dramatizing."

He only arched an eyebrow, though, and puffed his chest grumbling, "Mmm, am I?"

Juvia sighed, her head smacking against the crystal and watched how rainy clouds started to cover the dark sky.

"Juvia's worried," she said while frowning at the first few drops. Her back straightened and she glared outside as her dress wrinkled under her clutch. "Juvia's worried she'll be late even when she _knew_ and doom people that maybe don't deserve this and that there's something else escaping her."

"Escaping you?"

"Uh-huh. Like there was something more to Lullaby," she explained and Gray's face contorted into a frown. "Juvia's been trying to remember, but―"

But there was no answer, obviously, and Gray watched her fight tears back with a well-guarded scowl. Juvia clenched her teeth, reigned over her untamed feelings, or tried to, and threw her head back with an exasperated whimper. She could hear him huff and her lips thinned at that.

"All will go well," Gray reassured her, now only remaining in his boxers and heading towards the bed. He gave one last glance over his shoulder with a mean, tentative smile and added, "And if worse comes worst you and I'll kick butts and make it good."

In spite of the fact that she could not see anything else in the darkness of the night, her anxiety still haunting her and the imminent danger of mass-murderer music remaining, Juvia found herself returning the same smile when Gray caught her eye as he prepared to bed.

"Juvia'd like that," Juvia said and Gray nodded before falling asleep.

She didn't move from her place next to the tapping window, nonetheless, and kept waiting for something.

ooOOooOOoo

To Juvia's regret, however, the Oshinaba Station was taken over by some mages from a dark guild. The whispers of a supposed terrorist attack reached them quickly and they were quicker reaching the station to discover that the once guild of the town, Eisenwald, had seized it.

They looked over the sea of heads surrounding the building and listened to the gathered military platoon commanding the civilians to calm down as she squinted to see something above the racket and Gray made a path towards the station. They wouldn't be able to pass the security wards mobilized for the dark guilds action, Juvia thought, and wondered how they'd be able to walk into the building.

"Does Gray-sama think we could go in by the windows?" she asked while eying the panes.

Gray hovered over all the other gathered people, watching at something that stayed out her sight, and tugged her forward with a shake of his head.

"No need," he spoke above the noise. "Someone took care of the guards."

Juvia wasn't sure what he meant until he pushed her through the last front line of the multitude and into the staircases leading to the station. There was the military, all right, but most of them were knocked down on the floor and the few still awake attending them. Juvia thought, a bit bewildered by the scene, who would dare to do this but then reminded herself that they were dealing with people who had nothing against using the darkest inventions of Zeref-sama.

"Hey, stop there!" one of the positioned men yelled. "This place is under restriction, you _cannot_ waltz in―!"

"We're here to help," explained Juvia, still running.

"So were the other group and they didn't doubt when knocking off my coworkers," the man grounded, persecuting them.

"We don't have time for this," snarled Gray and sprinted inside the building while icing the floor for anyone who wanted to follow them.

She didn't object to the sort of mean-spirited treatment Gray was handing as she would have in any other circumstances, deciding that they should take care of Eisenwald first and then, once there was no imminent dread of murder, the scolding would come.

So they run through corridors and nooks and halls and didn't halt for nothing, even when Juvia had the inkling they lost themselves somewhere between the third or fourth turn. She could feel her heart, throbbing against her ribcage and the sound pounding in her ears until a new noise classed with everything else, and she looked at Gray who was frantically peeking inside every room as they moved on whit ragged breathes.

She pulled him back next to her, magic starting to swirl in her core as a signal that wrong was to come. Gray stared at her intensely.

"Gray-sama, wait," she urged with a deep intake of air, "do you heard that?"

They could hear it, yes, with each ticking second the noise clearing. There was something or someone approaching them from the hallways ahead, the boom of their steps reverberating against the brick walls as well as a roar that sound something like, "WRAAAAAH!"

"Who in the hell yells like that?" whispered Gray, settling into a fighting stance.

It didn't take long for the new individual to come into view once he turned the corner ahead them. It was a guy of their age, with scarf around the neck and strange, pink hair, and instead of slowing down upon seeing them, the boy fisted his hands with flames blazing from them.

"You, Eilsenwade _bastards,_ " he was roaring while brawling closer to them, "I'll destroy you!"

"Not _another_ fire mage," grumbled Gray next to her.

Juvia shifted from her position and stepped forward with her hands ups. "Wait, no! Does Pink-san mean if we're from Eisenwald?"

The fire mage didn't listen, and hurled a punch forward but Gray had been prepared forehand and the hit only landed against an ice-shield before it could touch her. Juvia heaved a sigh, casting a significant glance over her shoulders at Gray who just exhaled and frowned. He followed her lead, though, dropping any threatening pose as the shield shattered around them.

"Look here," he said with bared teeth, "we don't know who you are, but we're in no way with those fucking idiots from Eisenwald."

"We're chasing them," sniffled Juvia.

"So―you're not from that dark guild?" Pink questioned, eyebrows dotted together and muscles relaxing slightly.

"Juvia swears to Pink-san that she and Gray-sama are only here to stop them," Juvia said solemnly.

Pink blinked. "Who is Pink-san?"

"You are Pink-san, idiot," sneered Gray. "Your hair."

"Hey, leave my hair alone!" Pink blurted. "My name's Natsu and I'm from Fairy Tail! You better remember that."

Juvia blanched, teeth nagging the inside of her cheeks as she glanced over Gray. He had his nose scrunched and hands contracting closer, watching the new guy with narrowed eyes before tilting his head in her direction. Juvia pursed her lips, regarded Natsu once more and sifted apprehensively.

"If you're from another guild, that means that Natsu-san is here for the same reason as Juvia," she said carefully. "We could help each other if that's the case."

Pink― Natsu, she reminded herself, pouted as if he was thinking very deeply. "How do I know you aren't just playing with me, eh?" he argued and stomped the floor. "For all I know you're making time so that damn boss of yours can broadcast that stupid thing!"

"They what!" Gray shouted, appalled. "Are those people _mad?_ "

"They're going to kill everyone if they do that―even themselves!" Juvia cried and then, to Gray, she hurried, "We should get searching right now!"

"Yeah," Gray nodded harshly. He followed her when she began to sprint down the hall with her hat barely staying atop her head. "If they're broadcasting the song I've an idea where they might head to."

"Uh." Natsu backed off as it downed to him that they were running away from him. "Hey, stop! I was―"

They were too far ahead by the time the Fairy Tail mage reacted, though. Juvia rasped and trotted next to Gray with tensed muscles and a growing dread bubbling inside her. She could feel her stomach lurching and only when Gray touched her arm did she pay attention at what they were heading to.

"Juvia," he called between gasps.

Juvia didn't turn to face him. "Hmm."

He gazed at her with dark eyes and scrunched brow. "Something wrong?"

"No," Juvia muttered while speeding up as they turned another crossway. "Juvia's not… She'll be better once we're done with this mess."

"If you say," he said as if not really believing all she was telling him and then pushed her next to him where stood a door she had missed before. "Here, the studio for broadcasting. Let's go."

He kicked the door down and she followed suit.

ooOOooOOoo

The fight with the man that appeared from the ventilation system was quick and extremely one-sided to the point Juvia felt a tiny twinge of pity towards him. The sentiment was short-lived, nevertheless, when the Eisenwald mage, after a good beating, told them in no uncertain terms that their goal was actually Clover Town, no Kunugi Town; but that they would stop at nothing or anyone to achieve what they had set on doing even if they had to kill, maim and bring down a whole city down with them.

"Clover Town. What did they lose at Clover Town," Gray had snarled scathingly as they headed towards the exit. "Aiming for the guild masters too!"

Unluckily, the whole station was surrounded by a hurricane that would mince them if they even attempted to touch it. When they tried to overpass it, Juvia watched with wide eyes how her hand dissolved into water and droplets spread around viciously.

"Juvia's getting really annoyed now." She glared at the wind magic with distaste and squared her shoulders before spinning to face Gray. "Gray-sama?"

"Yeah, I know," he sighed while scratching at his forearm. "Take Mittens."

Juvia stood on her tiptoes and pecked him promptly before stepping back to see the effects of her action with sparkling eyes. "Juvia'll be waiting for Gray-sama," she stated. "So don't be late and try to keep your clothes on while Juvia isn't around to remind you."

"You go," Gray said gruffly and somewhat flustered. "Hand his ass on a silver dish for me and do what you know best."

"Juvia'll be delighted to do that." Juvia laughed as she transformed herself into water, inhaled deeply and blasted herself through the birdcage at such speed that the whipping sound rang in her wake.

Gray watched her cross the hurricane with his breath hitching in his throat. She barely managed to keep her liquid form with the howling wind, but once she made it to the other side, not a cut in sight and panting for the exercise and magic exhaustion, she gave one last, longing gaze at him before sprinting down the streets, searching for their leopard to hunt the Eisenwald bastard down.

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants and wondered how he should proceed now. Begrudgingly, he remembered the Fairy Tail mages and the remnants of the dark guild and decided that if he ever wanted to make it to Juvia before everything worsened more than it already did―not like Juvia'd fall, but just in case―, temporary alignment was in need.

"I'm gonna regret this," Gray groused while entering the Oshinaba Station once more and began exploring the building in search of others. "I'm so regretting it already _._ "

Gray found Pink, or Natsu or whatever, and what he supposed were his companions on their way to the main hall, carrying with them a rather tattered man. Gray shifted awkwardly from his position some feet away and coughed to make his presence known as the fire mage and the two women with him brusquely faced him.

"Hey, slanty eyes," Natsu cheered and Gray frowned at his new nickname. The boy looked at either side behind him and stared with a puzzled look. "Where is Blue?"

Gray jeered, balancing on his heels, and prepared a comeback to the idiot's choice of words to refer Juvia. The words didn't make pass his lips, though, because by the time Gray opened his mouth he found himself with a sword pointed at his throat even though he had minded the distance before approaching the little group.

"I remember you. You were in Onibas, at the bar," the redhead woman affirmed harshly. "Who are you? What are you here for?" And pushing the blade closer, she grinded out, "And you better answer the truth."

Gray gulped down the forming knot and gazed with a calmness he lacked. "Gray Fullbuster," he gritted with furrowed eyebrows at the fierce expression plastered on one of Juvia's numerous idols . "And the same as you. I think."

The woman, Erza Scarlet he recalled suddenly, didn't budge from her position but the blonde who had been quiet until then turned to the fire mage and asked, "Natsu, who were you referring when saying blue?"

"The girl with him. Came across them before fighting Kageyama here."

Scarlet glared at Gray but lowered the sword. "Where is she?"

"Juvia went ahead and is chasing the tosser with the damn flute," he spat.

"Who caaaares? I want to get out of here!" Natsu yelled, charging up a punch and clashed against their personal cage. "I'll just break through this!"

The blonde tailed after him with a worried expression. "H-hey, stop it, Natsu! You'll hurt yourself!" she squeaked while grabbing him back away from the currents of wind. Then, her gaze switched towards Scarlet and back to Gray. "How did your friend do that anyway? Bypass the magic wind, I mean. The barrier is practically impenetrable and if you try to one gets sliced."

Gray blinked owlishly and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Uh, well you see, she…"

"Aha, I know!" the fire idiot interrupted him and jumped from his spot on the floor while pointing at the girl with the ponytail. "Lucy," he screamed again with a barmy grin, "I know how to do it! Stellar Spirits!"

"Eh?"

"Natsu," Scarlet called, "what are you talking about?"

"We can get out using the Stellar Spirits!" Natsu repeated, excited. "Like in Evaroo's Mansion!"

There was a beat of silence, Gray feeling exceptionally uncomfortable now and recalling that perhaps this hadn't been such a bright idea with a piercing glare in Fairy Tail's direction, when out of nowhere another scream came from under them and he watched startled as a _cat on his two rear feet_ began to hop.

"Ahhhhh!" it spluttered with a smile. Gray noted, with his thoughts all muddled, that cats, in fact, could smile. "Lucy, I just remembered! Virgo's Key!"

Gray stared at the blue feline who he hadn't noticed before and scrubbed his hair while the other three began planning and muttering between themselves and he stood in the sidelines, watching at everything and anything as he uttered lowly, "The cat _speaks?"_

ooOOooOOoo

Juvia was somewhat wheezing as Mittens sped up through the rails heading to Clover Town. She felt tired after her stunt on getting out from the birdcage, but it didn't stop her when she brought down the man who had been flying away from the air back to earth with her water whisks as a disgusted frown began to form on her face.

Eligor groveled in the dirt before getting up and Juvia darted the last remaining space between them, leaving the leopard behind and readying for any sudden attacks while stamping her foot down with an authoritative air.

"Stop this, Eligor-san. It's over," she commanded before continuing with a taut stance and stressed words, "Please, it's not worth it."

Baffled, the Eisenwald mage stared at her for what it seemed for too long and then chortled, a deep, reverberating sound, making Juvia wary on her feet.

"Who are… No, it doesn't matter," Eligor snarled shaking his head and casted his magic with the precise movements of his hands. A burst shot out, blowing up sand and dust from the rails and Juvia barely managed to remain in place, backtracking one, two steps. "Do me a favor and die."

She clenched her fist as well as her teeth and stepped forward, calling forth water and magic and wiped the dirt that hindered her vision in a clean swipe. But before she could act, there was tornado downing on her, its sharp brisk of wind only countered by her water form.

Eventually, as the attack calmed down and seeing her opportunity right there, Juvia burst out one lash of boiling water up into the sky where Eligor floated with a mildly surprised expression. It failed.

"I see. Your body can transform into pure water at will." He stroke his chin with a revolting smile and shrugged. "It won't matter, anyway. So do your prayers, woman, and once I'm done with your pretty face the guildmasters come next."

Juvia glared furiously and spited, "Juvia's had enough of you."

She prepared herself for another round. Juvia worriedly wondered at the back of her mind if she could face this man cleanly before sorting out to her most unpleasant habit while magic swirled weakly and her muscles strained at the effort. She was in fact resigning to her fate of scaled skin and haws accompanied with gills when, out of the blue and before anyone could do anything about it, a pink and blue missile launched itself into Eligor and tackled him to the ground. A scream, a groan and a breaking sound boomed and Juvia tensed at the new intruder with suspicion arising once again.

Only as the latest opponent revealed she breathed out. "Pink-san!" Juvia chirped, eyes still set on the Eisenwald mage. "How did you get here?"

The pink-haired boy shook his head vigorously before jumping back into a guarded stance and stared at her dubiously before his face lighted up. "The girl with slanty eyes!" he burst out. "So it was you who held this one back! For a moment there I worried this bastard reached Old Master but―oi, Happy, are you okay?"

Juvia watched, dread pooling at the pit of her stomach, how Eligor's expression contorted into one of pure rage while Pink and his blue, winged companion cat-thing exchanged words.

"Pink-san, focus!" Juvia ordered as she Water Locked the mage in a bubble that he broke free from with a snap of his fingers.

The Fairy Tail mage somersaulted backwards as he shot a grateful thumbs up on her direction. Juvia seethed as Eligor avoided another assault of her water whips, only reacting to the man behind her when she heard the sound of deep breathing and felt her skin tingling at an unusual heat in the back of neck.

The ball of flames grazed her side before they dissolved into nothingness when Eligor counterattacked with an attack of his own.

"Told you, name's Natsu," Pink complained at her and Juvia chewed on her lip. "And this is my friend, Happy," he said pointing the cat who waved from his position. Then, holding a burning fist up and glaring at the enemy hovering some meters from the ground, Pink growled, "And _you_ ―I'll stop you!"

"You puny flies," Eligor spat, a trail of blood running down his mouth and the end of his cloak burnt. "You brought this onto you. Stormail!"

"Ohhh, _nice_." Natsu grinned from ear to ear with a ferocious glint as they watched the nasty winds surrounding their opponent. "Bring it on, soft breeze! My flame will take you on."

Juvia huffed, a bit disheveled by all the events happening all at once and wished that Gray would arrive as soon as possible. Because, even though they had the advantage of numbers, she wasn't so sure of what to think about her new ally.

She breathed out, however, and readied with steeled nerves. She couldn't afford to lose this.

ooOOooOOoo

"So," Gray coughed wryly, tilting his head towards the man next to him, "why are you bringing this one along?"

The blonde who had presented herself as Lucy Heartfilia clenched onto the cart's side with a soft whimper and said, "We couldn't leave him alone with those wounds," she explained. "He needs treatment ASAP and since there was no one at Kunugi, it's better to bring him to Clover Town.

The Eisenwald mage scoffed. "I think he meant why you saved me since I'm the bad guy here."

Gray kicked the man with a sneer and shrugged off his cloak with a swift motion.

"Don't put words I didn't say on my mouth," he said with a flat voice. "I just wondered why bring you when your guildmates could take care of you."

"As _if_ ," the man slurred, followed by a hollow laughter and began sweating bucks under Gray's intense glare. Next, with the same distressed expression, he regarded Heartfilia coldly. "If any of you had the hopes of using me as a bargaining chip to stop Eligor, he's _ruthless_. May as well off me now. He won't care―"

"How _dare_ you―" Heartfilia snapped, frowning while her grip tightened around the wood when the cart jerked once again. "Fairy Tail isn't that kind of guild who would play with humans' life as if they were nothing more than―"

"Y'know," Gray cut in smoothly, "seeing how you're spouting nonsense and have this obvious wish to die, I can do the job for you."

Heartfilia gasped and he could see from his peripheral vision Scarlet, sweating and panting from the magical exercise of pulling their transportation, turning towards them with a sharp motion. But it didn't matter in the slightest and Gray narrowed his gaze on the Eisenwald croon who was glowering back and continued:

"You should start counting your blessings and live for them; not throw a tantrum each time something goes wrong," he said in the same plain tone. "Everything doesn't have to come down to living or dying. And a guild's no more than a name and a mark, anyway. Nothing worthy to die for."

The mage bristled and, despite his severe injuries, started to get up. "How can you say that when you―"

The cart jerked to the side, almost falling off the rails, and Heartfilia scattered towards Scarlet with a worried expression while Gray grounded his teeth together. He could discern something along an apologize and reassurance from Scarlet; but once she calmed her friend, she turned around to confront them.

"Back there, cut it out," she said.

The ride was silent from there on, only disturbed by Scarlet's tired huffs and the sound of wheels against gravel. Gray observed Heartfilia squirming on her seat and sneaking glances between the Eisenwald guy and him.

She sighed, then, and said to him, "You're wrong."

He arched an eyebrow at her. "Hmmm?"

"A guild _is_ more than a name and a mark," she said matter-of-factly.

Gray shut his mouth close with a snap and stared ahead.

ooOOooOOoo

"You're strong," Natsu said to her as they observed the sprawled figure of Eligor, passed out after their last combined effort to bring him down, and rubbed his cheek. "I mean, I coulda beat him up myself but it was certainly easier with someone backin' up."

Juvia budged from her crouched position after checking that their opponent was actually incapacitated and agitatedly picking up the flute from the ground. A scathing itch at the back of her mind clawed restlessly as her skin prickled because of the objet, all wrong and wicked, and she glared at the flute with pinched brow. It took her a moment, gulping down the vile sensations, before she lowered it and shook the feeling off.

She stared at Pink before allowing a hesitant smile to surface.

"You're strong too, uhm… Natsu-san."

The cat approached them with unbelievably huge eyes and toothy grin, and looked up to them, saying, "Aye, Natsu's the strongest and the amazinest too!"

The fire mage laughed loudly, throwing praises to himself as the cat joined him in the task while Juvia watched them once she dusted off with pursed lips. There was something reminiscent about the boy in front of him: the way his cheeks hollowed and his nose perked up and his eyebrows scrunched. Small things that alone wouldn't steal her attention not even for a second but all put together made her brow wrinkle in thought.

This, she thought, was unnerving to say the least, in a way that shouldn't be possible but somehow was.

"Hey," he called, waving a hand in front of her. "Heeeey, you there?"

Juvia blinked, exhaled and gnawed on her lower-lip, embarrassed. "Oh, Juvia's sorry. She was a bit distracted, but―Does Juvia know you?" she couldn't afford but asking while squinting at Pink and the cat. "As if Juvia's seen Natsu-san before, somewhere, but not quite."

The fire mage face scrunched in utter surprise and peered at her through suspicious eyes. Juvia shuffled, peeved, and blushed a light red.

"Eh? What kind of question's that?"

"Maybe she's your fan?" the cat provided thoughtfully. "Maybe she liiiikes you, Natsu. Like one of those Erza's or Mira's fans who always send letters and stuff."

Juvia perked at that but before she could rectify the situation Natsu bumped a fist in the air. "Ohhh, Happy! That's it! You could have said so, y'know."

"Uhm, no, Juvia's―"

The screeching of wheels and shouts in the distance silenced her. She could discern a cart nearing their position, halting just next to Mittens who had been licking herself and watched how people dropped off from it hurriedly.

"Hey, Erza!" Natsu waved. "This girl says she's my fan! Ain't that cool?"

"Natsu, keep it down," a skinny blonde reprimanded assisting Erza Scarlet walk. "Don't you see she's tired after using all her magic? But…well done stopping Eligor," she finished, smiling broadly, while Scarlet congratulated him as well.

Juvia peeped when Gray materialized before her and sighed with a soft expression and a tired eyes. She could feel the warm swarming inside her again and smiled, motioning an exact replica on him.

"Fan. Of that one," he said nonchalantly. "Since when?"

"Gray-sama." Juvia hugged him with all her force and took glimpse of the women speaking with Natsu before leveling a gaze back on him. "What was Gray-sama doing with two women―alone?"

Gray huffed and shrugged her off as easily as he would a jacket. "Not _this_ again," he mumbled, scowling at her, and leant closer. "Anyway. Lullaby?"

"Here." Juvia held the flute high and they both stared at it for a good while before lowering it away, wary of the heavy presence it carried and the uncomfortable sensation pooling at the pit of their stomach.

There was something about it, its shape or form or essence that reeked of bad auguries and worse fates.

Gray harrumphed. "Good. Bet you it was easy peasy and you steamrolled that man, Eligor was it?"

"It was," she said with a mischievous glint that made him grin. "Now, Juvia can stop worrying about all this."

Their moment was cut short, though, when Fairy Tail moved towards them. Erza Scarlet headed their little group and cleared her throat before bowing just the tiniest bit with her red hair falling around her and the two behind her followed her lead.

"You two," Scarlet began with a calculative face before it bloomed into a tiny smirk. "Thank you for helping. I don't know what would have happened if you hadn't slowed Eligor down," she said and Natsu and Blonde smiled brightly.

"It's nothing," Juvia mumbled while Gray snorted at her starry eyes.

It seemed, Juvia mused, that Gray would never get over her perfectly normal and tame idolization of the things and people she liked. So she tilted her head innocently and he rolled his eyes.

Unaware of the silent conversation going on, Scarlet nodded solemnly. "At any time, I think we should head up to the Masters and hand them Lullaby―"

It rattled, the ground, and the squealing sound alerting them of something going wrong, but way before they could do something about it already went down the wrong path.

By the time Juvia fell on her guarded stance, she was pushed down by a shadowy hand, only held back from falling to the ground thanks to Gray's hands grasping her. She watched as a trail of dust left them behind, carrying with it Lullaby and their hope. Juvia swore internally as her eyes widened.

"That son of a _bitch_ " she heard Gray growl so lowly that made her chill at the sheer disgust it detained, although the shouts from Fairy Tail swallowed everything whole and Juvia observed Erza Scarlet barking orders right and left while the other two tried to keep up with her. They were like headless chicken, Juvia thought, all confused and scared and clutching at straws.

Nevertheless, Juvia allowed herself a second to give in before she pulled herself together again and soldiered on towards Mittens with Gray tagging along close by. He was tense, but kept sending worried glances in her direction and Juvia briefly wondered how she might have looked there but casted away the idea. It didn't matter.

Once they were prepared, she gave one last suffering groan and gritted, "Let's go."

ooOOooOOoo

They reached Clover Town in no time but still too late to stop the Eisenwald guy― Kageyama, wasn't that what the Fairy Tail mages said?―from meeting the Masters. Kageyama was speaking with this old, tiny man with a bizarre cap that was smiling up by the time they found him, and when they were about to brake in, stop the madness and settle everything back as it should be, another plump man shushed them quiet.

"All is right. Just watch," he had said while Erza Scarlet protested and Juvia caught something along the lines that the one interfering with their task was, in fact, the master of Blue Pegasus or so.

She wasn't paying further attention, though, her mind railing at great speed and eyes darting from Kageyama to the little man and back to Gray, and in a desperate attempt if worse came worst, pulled Gray's head lower so she could reach him.

"Juvia! What are you doin'?" hissed Gray. "Stop putting your hands on my ears."

"Just in case Eisenwald Mage-san decides to use Lullaby!" she protested.

"And you think _this_ will work?"

"Gray-sama shouldn't worry about Juvia," she answered pointedly ignoring him. "Juvia's bogging her ears with water."

Gray glared, his chest rising with it, and huffed. "Juvia, listen, you're being paranoid―"

The blonde girl glanced at them, expression obviously distressed and pointed at herself, her friends and the Master still talking with Kageyama. "Uhm, could you do that, the water trick, with me…us, too, please?"

"Don't worry, Lucy," Natsu cut in with his face contorted into something feral, "I'm plummeting that asshole before he blows the first note of that flute."

"All of you," Scarlet growled at them with her sword only half-sheathed and mouth snarling despite Blue Pegasus' Master's reassurance that they hadn't had to worry, "shut up."

Juvia gawked and then turned to Gray who just shrugged. "She's scary."

"You haven't seen her when she gets real." Natsu snickered, although a bit jadedly, and then whispered in a confident, strained tone to them, "Erza resembles a true demon when really angry."

Gray stared at the fire mage flatly. "Doubt that."

Juvia whined to him.

The next they heard was, for all their relief, a defeated moan from Kageyama who had kneeled in front of the tiny old-timer and, to Juvia's surprise, started sobbing. There was collective sigh of respite at the scene. Lullaby was thrown away and the imminent danger dealt with, and Juvia watched how Fairy Tail jumped forward, cheering and clapping what she supposed was their guild's master in the back.

" _Finally,_ " Juvia heard Gray mumble next to her and she nodded weakly in response. She didn't relax, however, not just yet, and casted a worried once-over to the lawn where she guessed Zeref's invention had fallen.

The itching was back once again, gnawing at her as if she had been forgotten something that shouldn't have been, and she hugged herself with one arm while Gray watched her with furrowing eyebrows. Juvia pursed her lips as she tried to remember what the thing that disturbed her was.

It came then, the memory, as soon as her eyes set on the demonic flute never better said before and she retaliated with hitched breath and huge, bulging eyes. Flashes swirled inside her, and a shooting voice that had just the tiniest tinge of exasperation of someone finding a little kid snooping around where she shouldn't have flooded her mind, explaining carefully in words that even a kid could understand why he was _so_ disappointed in her.

"Juvia," he had chided long, long ago in their little hiding spot of somewhere long gone, "how many times have I told you that you shouldn't enter this room?"

She put the pretty in a horrific way drawings of a gigantic, horned monster and object that resembled a flute back on the table and blushed at the fact she had been caught red-handed. "But Juvia was curious! And Zeref-sama spends so many hours here, so Juvia thought to look into these drawings and―"

"Those are not for little girls like you," he chastised sternly, but still somehow came out as fondly. "Forget about them. They are not for anyone to see or understand." He looked around, regarding the papers, his unfinished inventions and the diaries, and when his gaze found the slightly ajar door in the far corner, he turned sharply to her, asking in a somewhat darker tone that chilled her to the core, "Did you go into that room?"

She shook her head almost instantly with his dark eyes glistering. "Nuh-uh. Juvia promises."

"Good," Zeref had said, nodding, and tenderly patted her in the head. "Let's go, it's time for your weekly checkup."

Juvia stepped back, aghast at the vivid, nostalgic memory that blurred her sight with unshed tear, and then she stepped forward, pushing away all the overwhelming feelings and calling forth on water whips and magic that was just one idea away from storming out in something that she feared more than she feared their current predicament.

"Juvia, what the fuck." Gray tugged on her sleeves and tried to pull her back towards him but it was too late, her whisks already shoving every gathered master and the Fairy Tail members to the sides in a sneak attack.

They protested first, before readying for another attack and facing her with their weapons withdrawn or magic blazing. Gray, too, took a fighting pose and glared at her. Her eyes didn't' dither from Lullaby. She had remembered. She had remembered the drawings of the stupid flute next to a gigantic monster, and it was enough to set all alarms on.

"What was that for?!" someone yelled with a snarl. "What are you trying to do, uh?"

Juvia sniffled, feet grounding on the earth. "Lullaby's awakening," she mumbled weakly, voice cracking at the end of the sentence, and pointed the flute.

And it happened as she spoke. Smoke came out from the mouth of the skull adorning one of the ends of the musical instrument, going up, up in the sky like ominous clouds that could bring no good and slowly but unstoppable took form. Juvia felt her heart sink and fear clutching it, giving even three little steps back much like all the presents did as the enormity that was the true Lullaby with its rotten body made of wood hovered above everyone else.

It had horns and claws and was so big that you had to crane your neck if you wanted to look up into its eyes that resembled endless holes. Juvia heaved a deep breath, her inside churning at the idea of fencing this monster in front of guild's masters who would call out her existence to the Magic Council, and gathered her magic for the oncoming scales and gills and the rest of the fanfare that scared her.

Except a hand gripped her shoulder and when she looked up, she found Gray's stern and mildly irritated face."You didn't tell me about this!" he quietly growled outside the earshot of the others who were freaking out at the new figure. "Next time send a memo before pulling stunts like that at _least._ "

Next, drawing her closer to him and shooting a glare over her and at the gaping people, he added, "Let's _wait_. See if we can do something before you go full martyr."

"And if Juvia has to?"

Gray straightened instantly, his gaze darkening at her words but cut out when the raspy, broken voice of Lullaby boomed above every other sound. "Let me consume your pitiful souls," it said with a crooked smile that didn't seem natural on the thing. "Now, which should be the first one?"

"Whazzdat?!" Pink blurted and then looking back at the blonde, asked again, "And souls are edible since _when_?"

Juvia was the one who took the task of answering the question with a sniff and a scowl. "That's… Lullaby's true form created by Zeref-sama's magic," she explained stiffly. "It's living magic."

"Zeref-sama…" Scarlet stuttered with a thoughtful, suspicious expression and the blonde girl perked up at that. "The Dark Mage Zeref of four hundred years ago?"

Nevertheless, by then Lullaby began opening its mouth, laughter reverberating from it and the pull of magic swelled inside them. Juvia whipped the demon's legs, for fear and raw survival instinct that seemed to have swallowed her whole, while she felt the cold of Gray's magic doing its wonders by casting a shield over everyone when Lullaby retaliated with its own attack.

Natsu and Erza Scarlet joined them as well, fortunately; Juvia saw how one blasted fire from his mouth and the other cut down the demon with her overpowered armors and blades while approaching the monsters and slowly climbing up its limbs. They did a quick work of backing the demon, aided by her and Gray's tries of unbalancing Lullaby.

Their little group of four kept the relentless attack. It was the only way Juvia knew they had any hope and prayed that the masters gathered there were knowledgeable on Sealing Magic because she wasn't feeling like they had even the ability of completely finishing off one of Zeref-sama's demons.

"Erza, Natsu, bring it down now!" the tiny man next to the blonde yelled over the clamor of their magic. "The other Masters are ready to cast the sealing spells! You two should do the same, too," he added to Gray and Juvia with a curtly nod and gentle voice. But, almost instantly, his wrinkled face obscured and his eyes narrowed on Juvia. "And then you, young woman, would you explain why did you know about Lullaby's secret no other was aware of and Zeref- _sama_?"

Juvia winced at that, heard Gray's bristle close, and scooted away from the man. Gray attempted to catch her gaze but she dismished it in favor of paying attention to Lullaby.

Juvia glimpsed the pink spot crawling up the monster's neck and oversaw Scarlet flying towards it, both of them preparing their last combo while she and Gray did the same. Water and ice swirled around them before with a last push and Lullaby's piercing scream rupturing the air it exploded against its chest. She saw the fire from Natsu's mouth and the big black sword wildly swinging in Erza's hand adding to the mix, and finally― _finally_ ― it was over.

And Lullaby fell.

Juvia heaved a sigh of relief when the mages around began sealing it away.

"After this," Gray said grumbling, "I wanna a whole week off. And you're inviting me for the next ten meals."

"Juvia'll gladly invite Gray-sama to trout." She giggled when he pulled a face. "With limon."

Gray huffed. "This is no way of rewarding someone." When she staggered, drained and sweating, he held her from her shoulders and drew her closer. "Tired?"

She nodded against his chest, the constant overuse of magic finally catching up and dragging her further down. There was no time for this, however. Not yet when that man's words still rang on her ears, with its underlining accusation and suspicions a flat-out warning.

Would you explain why you knew what no one else did, he had meant, but the truth couldn't be said to them with their connections, and she straightened up at the remaining thread still looming over them.

"Juvia thinks she won't get a moment to catch her breath," she said, glancing the other way where Fairy Tail and the masters were talking and Gray followed her. "Or even a week. We need―"

"Yeah, I can see. They know something's up," he answered and started walking slowly, calling for Mittens who was hidden between the bushes, and softly pushed Juvia towards her while still keeping a watch on the celebrating group. "Let's get outta here before they notice."

ooOOooOOoo

They barely made it.

They were discovered fleeing half-way mounting Mittens, but managed to leave their persecutors behind thanks to the leopard's neck breaking speed.

So they run and only stopped in a run-down inn somewhere between Magnolia and Kunugi where no one in their sane mind would stop to search. They rented a room from the old, barmy woman and it was only then, after they were alone and she was lying on the bed after exhaustion took her, when Juvia allowed herself to truly fear.

She rolled on the mattress, and watched Gray taking care of their equipment in complete silence before she couldn't stop herself from asking the inevitable.

"Now what?" she said.

Gray halted his action, looking at her from the other side, and scratched his arm with a frown grazing his features.

"Now," he began warily, "we take some holidays away until things calm down."

Juvia sighed while interlacing their hands together once he got close to do so. This was sweet of him, trying to keep a resemblance of a plan and serenity much like he did back when they failed that mission of saving the woman who had been kidnapped and then tortured and Juvia had started bailing her eyes out at the unfairness of all it. But then again, he always failed in the way his brow creased and quivered, and she smiled up at him.

"Juvia doubts we have the jewels for that."

"Why do you insist on trashing my plans?" he scoffed.

Her smile widened just the tiniest bit. "Juvia lives for two things: loving Gray-sama and shooting down plans."

He groaned, somehow flustered, and glared at her for a long moment before picking up his discarded pants from the floor and threw them to the bed. When he looked back, there was this serious expression on him that made Juvia wait for something she might have not liked.

"I have an idea where we can get a good chunk of jewels," Gray said, and seemed to believe it too. "It's a bit crazy though. And kinda impossible, but eh, we both are all about impossible."

He smirked weakly, which made her smirk too, and Juvia thought that, if they were so deep in trouble already, what could get worse.

So she answered with the same worn out tone and shrugged.

"Juvia guesses we are."

* * *

 **Notes:** OKAY, finally canonland and FT reunion and lots of other things! Yeshhh. But, because there's always a but, my semi-regular update time of around 3 weeks ends here.

It's time to go back to Uni and all the bullshit it carries, and if my timetable is anything like the year before ('coz I STILL don't know what timetable I have, fuck you uni) my free time will be nonexistent. SO, updates from here on will take much, much longer. Months maybe, and I hope you all understand this. C'est la vie.

Now, with the chapter. Being honest here, it was hard to pull off but I think I, maybe, kinda managed it. Sort of. Tried to make the first meeting between FT and GruVia kind of goofy, "this guys're fucking strange" deal for both parties but still made them wary of each other, which is hella hard with FT and I'm not sure. Uh. Anyway. Skipped or altered most fights, too, because I didn't feel they added anything to the plot or characters. So there.

Thank you so much for favorites and follows and the reviews by dragonball256, Guest, SleepingNanny, Contrail, Merle the Great (You're right, Lyon wasn't in Lamia Scale in canon before Galuna, but I'm taking some liberties here so I hope it's not much of a bother!), mecglove, Laudi12 and winterliebend, and hope you all will be patient with me because next chapter _finally_ introduces Lyon and Ultear and I have been _so_ waiting for that!


	5. Galuna Island I

**N/A:** So. I'm alive. For now anyway. And so is this fic. Shit's been chaotic in life and I think the words 'free time' have pretty much dissapeared from my vocabulary. Which is a way to say "this is my excuse for not writing shit for months and I'm not sorry at all :) !"

Anyway. Here goes next chapter that I'm honestly not sure I managed to write. Hope you can still enjoy it.

Also, I might start editing previous chapters in my free time (whazzat, lol). Cuz the funny thing about the passage of time is that once you look back there's _cringe_ there. _Lots._

Thanks for the favorites and the follows and the reviews! You're all love! I hope you can be as patient from here on, too! \\(ºvº)/

* * *

 _Galuna Island I_

Gray coughed.

The astounded silence after his words unnerved him. Even when the seconds ticked on, Gustav and Clara remained silent on the lacrima, as did Juvia next to him, and it aggravated him the more time passed.

As a result, Gray cleared his throat, arched an eyebrow towards everyone present, and grumbled, "So?"

That seemed to do the trick and the kid jumped on her father's knees, startling everyone. "Why would big bro and sis destroy the moon?" the four-year-old demanded only like a child could. "S'beautiful when full and-and-and… even if it was a meanie to you, bro and sis shouldn't be that harsh―!"

"Sweetie," Gustav called down with a bemused but still staggered expression, "go with papa, 'kay?"

Carla looked up at her father, then back to them and pouted such a pronounced sulk that it had to be deliberate. Gustav gently pushed her down with a stern stare that was not quite natural on him. She left, eventually, after stopping at each step and gazing back every second. Once the kid was gone, Gustav seized a steady stare of them to find twin smiles on him and Juvia that drew a defeated soft frown from him.

"Ye dismiss'd this mission at first," he said in the end with furrowed brow. "Why now?"

"We…" Gray started, but then blinked not sure how to proceed. He looked at Juvia who was munching on her lower lip for permission.

She got the clue and fidgeted with her head laid on his shoulder. "Juvia and Gray-sama need money," she blurted, eyes darting everywhere. "We were careless and, uhm, not caught, no, but we'd rather hole up somewhere for a couple weeks."

"Ah," the man behind the lacrima sighed. "Bad stuff, then."

"Sort of," Gray agreed.

Gustav's face wrinkled in thought. "Yer can spend time 'ere?" he said with an edge to the words. "Evelina's got a hut somewhere in de forest if ye gotta _really_ hide. Don't think she'd ever mind."

Gray squirmed in his chair, mouth creasing into a worried grimance, and when Juvia's hand tightened around his left arm, he subtly nodded.

"We'd rather not put you under trouble," he explained, shrugging. " 'Sides, any people who kinda knows us can track us down to Daffodil easily, so it's not the best idea anyway."

Gustav grunted, relieved and guilty and with a bit of sadness, and Gray leant against the chair with his arms sprawled haphazardly, but not particularly accusing, while Juvia fidgeted next to him. He could hear her sigh as she leant forward towards the lacrima and tapped the table to gain their attention.

"Juvia wants to know," she chirmed when the silence stretched out for too long. "What's this destroying the moon mission about?"

ooOOooOOoo

Galuna was a boat ride from Harujion port, a little island in the south of Fiore that was cut off from the mainland in every way except for the occasional ship for supplies and news.

It was also cursed.

They should stay away from Galuna, the inhabitants had claimed as they shot down any petition for a ride to the island, the island had demons and rituals and weird shit that no one had an explanation for. It was somewhat unsettling.

The irrational fear for Galuna escalated to the point where Juvia had to convince one of the fisherwoman they helped last time they passed through Harujion to lend them a simple boat and take care of Mittens in their absence. And, even then, the woman insisted they should stay the heck away from the dammed island. Gray could already sense the coming blisters on his arms and Juvia's magical fatigue after a whole day of rowing, all mixed with the threatening cautions and pressing time-frame.

"This is a splendid way to start a mission," he had complained to Juvia as they sailed. "It was nothing sort of awful with the impossible task of destroying the moon, but after this we should maybe go back and accept the hut in the middle of the forest."

Juvia had smiled at that, the kind of half-crooked smile she used whenever she knew he was bluffing, and hummed, "Juvia doesn't' think Gray-sama would be happy with that, though. And Juvia's interested in what this demons gossips are about."

Gray rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Of course you'd be."

They arrived to Galuna at dusk, found the little village full of people that were suspicious of everything outside their walls made of wood and fear, and entered through the big gates that only opened when the gatekeepers decided they were good to do so.

They came into the town to find what must have been the whole population of the island gathered in the main street to greet them; stiff, looming figures that seemed as ominous as the request they had applied for. Covered all the way to the toes made them a bit menacing as far as Gray was concerned, and one of them, a hunched figure with a well-preserved staff, stepped forward so silently that Gray pursed his mouth into a white line.

"This isn't welcoming or anything," he whispered to Juvia low enough not to be heard, but she shushed him and pointed that they should listen to whatever they were about to say.

The elderly coughed once before speaking up. "Thank you for coming. My name's Moka and I welcome you to our village," he said, a weird, cracked hoga-hoga sound coming from under his hood. "I apologize if this startles you, but we need to show what the extent of our situation is. Clothes off, all."

So they did, uncovering themselves for the first time and Gray felt his throat compressing when they showed off what he thought could only be described as disfigured and blackened limbs and bodies. He sensed Juvia stiffening next to him as they stared on, and Moka stared back at them.

"This _forms_ are a curse befallen on everyone of the island," he sneered, a clawed hand stretching in a mocking defiance. "It started appearing three years ago or so, when the moon turned purple."

"Purple…" Juvia said with her forehead creased. "The moon hasn't turned purple, though."

There were sobs and low grumbles that belonged to the inhabitants while the leader silenced them before facing them once again. With his eyes shadowed and his face contorting into a mix of anger and sadness and disgust, he said, "That's what the mainlanders say; yet, it does turn purple in our island, and it changes _us,_ completely _._ Curses us with these bodies."

Gray tilted his head with more questions than before.

"What do you mean by changing―?" was he about to ask, but couldn't finish when at last the sun disappeared behind the horizon and only its last remains of light lingered behind.

The moon was up by then―glowing a faint purple, indeed, and Gray heard Juvia gasp with him. That wasn't the strangest thing, however, because when they lowered their heads back to the people gathered there, they listened to their screams of pain while watching, bewildered and horrified and surprised, how their skin lost its human pink and their bodies sharpened with spikes and wings and any other type of elements that shouldn't be there. Gray held his breath as he felt Juvia clenching onto his arm.

The moment passed, then, and Galuna Island's people stood there with miserable faces and figures that were everything but human. It took long, drown out minutes before Moka took up the word again and, even then, it sounded as if his voice came from a dark and faraway place.

"You don't seem impressed," he said.

"We are. Believe me," said Gray.

Moka smirked weakly. "But not as scared as anyone else would have been."

Gray gulped down the knot forming in his throat and frowned at the scenery. "That's 'coz you aren't the first we meet," he explained. "Demons, I mean. So, we're a bit familiar with this."

Juvia sprung up to life at that moment, wide, searching eyes switching to determiner ones, and strode towards the old man with her lips twisted into a thin line. Gray felt a surge of pride surging when he saw her kneeling down to find herself face to face with Moka, and her hands sought out to wrap the man's wrinkle ones between hers.

Her dark eyes were firm and warm and welcoming, and Moka stared at her like she was crazy.

"Juvia'd like to know how this happened," she stated with a firm, leveled tone. The elderly mayor seemed baffled at the touch, almost as if he couldn't quite believe someone was willing to do so in that form. It made Gray's stomach lurch at the familiarity of it all and Juvia's grip tightened as she continued, "The story―the full story. So that way Gray-sama and Juvia can find the problem and help you return to your normal lives. It's a promise."

The silence that followed was heavy before everything fell apart, the whimpers and the despair thick in the air, and Moka lowered his head in defeat while latching onto Juvia's warmth.

"My son― _My son…_ I have to―my dear, _dear_ son _,_ " he cried, heartbroken, and Gray thought, his gaze fixated in the sad people before him and Juvia's worried glance, that there must be a darker side to the story that maybe they weren't ready for. "Destroy the moon that has brought this upon us," Moka ordered with his expression contorted into something definitely ugly and tears staining his patched skin. "Give back our humanity. _Please._ "

ooOOooOOoo

The next morning Gray woke up to a handful of hand shoved on his face after a restless night. Admittedly, it took longer than usual to discern that it _was_ a hand; but still affected by sleep and seeing how it was scaled in aquamarine colors with the fingers webbed together, making it look something entirely different, Gray didn't doubt to groan in annoyance.

"What's this?"

"Juvia's hand," said Juvia appearing before his eyes. "She woke up like this."

Gray squinted, her words registering, and licked his lips when he finally understood what she meant. "That's not normal."

"No," she agreed with her eyebrows knotted together. "It's not."

"Moka did warn us that this could happen. Like to them," he tried to reason while getting up.

"Gray-sama's clean, though." Juvia caught his hand and showed him that his skin was the usual pink.

"Okay. Another mystery for the pile since the purple moon and cursed people weren't enough. Good," Gray said and cursed when he almost tripped on his own mound of clothes. "The situation's getting better with each second."

Juvia stifled a snicker, handing him his pants while glaring at her hand and willing it to reverse back to the pale skin. "Here." Gray muttered a thanks and briefly wondered, not for the first time, how did Juvia manage to wake up so early to be all prepared and dressed by the time he bothered to even open his eyes. "Juvia thinks we should explore first. The island and that thing we saw yesterday night?"

"The creepy light column coming from somewhere within the island that scared us shitless?"

"Yes." She nodded, smirking with him. "And then look into the people before trying to―to…uh, blow up the moon."

Gray chuckled and helped her to stand up from the floor, careful not to stumble with his half-worn pants.

"Yeah, good idea. S'not like we can do much else," he breathed out as he finished dressing and glanced outside their window. "Let's find something to eat and get moving."

Within a half an hour they set off into the jungle surrounding the village, with the few directions from the people and just a general idea of what they set out to do. They had asked first where they could look into the weird light from the night, only to receive half-hearted mumbles that didn't make much sense and lazy pointers to somewhere in the northwest; but since there was no other clue, they headed there.

They found ruins.

Ancient ruins that somehow had endured the passing years to the best of their capacities, and stood in the middle of the jungle in a glaring contrast to the lush green surrounding it. They had gazed at them with jaws slack and approached them cautiously, careful in the case they crumbled down with one wrong step.

Ruins that, if going by Juvia's scrunched up face, weren't simple remaining of a culture long gone, and Gray wondered what was wrong this time around.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Mmm. It's just― Juvia feel doesn't _right_ being here." She nodded to the inscriptions engraved on the stone inside the main entrance. "Juvia thinks this was a temple dedicated to drive away all malign beings, so…"

Gray peeped the moon shaped writings and sneered at the o-so-aptly-put coincidence. "Moon Island, and a purple moon, and a light in the night and that strange curse."

He strode in, the stone floors reverberating to his steps as his lips curled with the bizarre situation they found themselves in. "So―we start searching here, right?" he asked turning to Juvia. "It's pretty much the only place that can tell us anything."

She nodded, albeit slow and hesitant, staggering inside the building with wobbly legs and not quite scared eyes but something that was close. Gray huffed, got closer and looked down on her.

"If you don't feel well here just _say_ so, Juvia," said Gray and Juvia shot him a meek glance. "We'll do this quick and get out as fast, 'kay?"

"It's okay," she answered brightly. "Juvia can manage worse than this."

So, in they went.

They yexplored the chambers to find nothing but grubbiness and plants taking over stone. More of the same awaited them in the upper levels of the temple, except for a room where they found supplies, food and sleeping bags. Gray glanced at Juvia who did the same and both of them nodded in mutual agreement of being more cautious from then on in case they encountered unwanted people.

At one point, when they were giving one last look in the entrance hall and night was slowly taking over the day, deciding for them that it was high time to go back to the village, Gray noticed Juvia hunched over in the middle of the room.

"Gray-sama, watch this," she called and when he approached her, Gray saw the hole in the ground that was parallel of the other holes in each floor that opened up to the sky above. "What does Gray-sama think?"

"I can't see shit of what's down there," he stated flatly.

Juvia rolled her eyes, giving him _the_ look, and sighed, "Do we try going down tomorrow?"

Gray shrugged and headed outside to walk back to the town. There were sounds of the night, owls and other nocturnal animal crawling around them, and even though the sunlight was dimming with each ticking second, it was still clear and bright enough to see. In few seconds, however, all natural noise silenced instantly, the air being cut with a screeching noise that had Gray and Juvia tensing as soon as they heard it.

They scrawled back to the shadows that would hide them as the screech repeated. This time it sounded clearer while they rounded one of the protruding sides of the ruins, and they discerned the little whining undertone of it.

"Oh, Angelica. I know this can be hard―the humidity and the lack of proper food, but hold on, dear," Gray heard someone say while Juvia and him squatted to not be seen. The voice carried on while their heads peered over the hiding spot. "Our _Reitei_ informed us it'd take only one more week before we finish the ritual and the beast is unsealed. And then it'll be _ours,_ and we'll be free to love, see?"

Juvia made a noise in the back of her throat when she distinguished the two shadowy figures just some meters away from them. "Is that a giant _rat_?" she whispered a bit disgusted. "Juvia doesn't like rodents."

"Yeah, think it is," replied Gray. When the unknown woman and the rat started walking, they dove after them. "Don't think that woman is part of the islanders, either. And all that camp material inside must belong to someone."

"And the beast they're talking about," Juvia added with puckered brows. " _Reitei,_ too. Juvia wonders who that one is."

Gray grunted, acknowledging their discovery for what it was, and walked as silently as they could manage while keeping a distance from the woman and her pet.

ooOOooOOoo

Gray and Juvia followed the two shady figures around the temple, up the hill and into what was once the roof of the ancient ruins. The sight awaiting for them was another matter completely that took them by utter surprise.

They had to slither through the few rocks on the place, occulting themselves from the little cult standing there with robes and all. Gray thought, with sharpened sense and scrunched nose, that the more he learned about the place, the more he wondered if he should have ever taken on the request, and Juvia's mirroring expression assured him that he wasn't the only one with similar thoughts.

Alas, the beam of light of the previous night and the strange chants from the circling people casted away any musings to make pass to the horrific notion of what was, seemingly, a ritual.

Juvia fidgeted, her hands restless crossing and uncrossing as she said, "What does Gray-sama think those people are doing?"

Gray grunted, counting the gathered people. A dozen so far. "Dunno. But I don't like it."

"It looks like they're collecting the moon's light in one place," whispered Juva lowly, her face up to the sky where the celestial body was shining. "Doesn't the moon have some strong magical proprieties or so?"

"Yeah. It does." His eyes scanned over the place, Juvia's shaking shoulder against his a reminder of what they heard that woman said. Tey were unsealing a beast, probably using this ritual or whatever for it, and suddenly the situation became more bleak than before. "Let's… let's return to the village, ask Moka about all this and plan something against these creeps."

Juvia's blank stare was all he received in exchange.

"Who?" she asked and Gray felt his mouth curl into a frown at her equally blank tone.

"Moka?" he prompted. "The old mayor of the town." She blinked as dumbfounded as before and Gray clenched his jaw shut because, even though Juvia's memory never had been something to praise, it never was as bad. "God," he breathed out. " _This_ creeps me out now."

He was ready to nudge her out of there, a short explanation on the tip of his tongue when a shadow casted over them and a recognizable feminine voice said, "Angelica, love, what have you found with that precious nose of yours."

Gray cursed as he materialized an ice-shield and him and Juvia jumped back away from the rat, its owner and all the other mages standing there, their chants silenced and every single one of them facing them.

" _Reitei,_ look what the rat brought in," another man next to the woman called, and Gray had to freeze his expression from becoming something that would cause more problems than it was worth when he noted the man's stupidly huge eyebrows. "Sherry, I think they followed you."

"And Angelica found them, Yuuka," she bit back, only as dreamy as she had sounded before, somehow. "Love conquers it all, after all."

"That is for me to decide."

The new voice was harsh and smeared behind the helmet he wore, but it was smooth and clean enough for Gray to recognize despite everything else. It brought memories of years ago, of a time when life was all about smug feminine gaze, repetitive bickering and endless training under the snow. It bristled the tiny hairs at the back of his neck and what once was a defensive stance before Juvia, ready to attack or scram, became all taut and wary at the same time the new man appeared from behind the ranks of mages.

"Lyon?" Gray snarled, face pale and eyes huge but hands firmly fisted. "What are _you_ doing here?"

Lyon Vastia took out the helmet, sneered and said, "That's my question, Gray."

For a moment they stood there, the air thick with apprehension and suspense only sprouted from decades of two men who knew the other all too well. In a world that maybe everything past wasn't such a tragedy, they might have met each other with haughty smiles and playful punches, but, as it was, there was nothing more than disdain and cynicism there.

And Lyon stared, unblinking. As did Gray.

"It's been a long time," Lyon said at last. "Did the townspeople of that village send you to stop me?"

Gray scoffed. "Yeah, seems so."

"A big coincidence, then," the other said. "Or fate. But I've never been a believer of fate, so maybe not."

"That's because Ur thought us not to and that we should take our lives with our own hands," remarked Gray, and Lyon growled in such a way at the name that, if he didn't know him from before, it would have scared him.

Gray felt the brush of a dress and the sound of fidgety feet before he heard her, whispering with fear and decisions, "Gray-sama, what's going on?"

His mind railed for an answer. He himself wasn't sure about anything―although there was something, because Gray remembered Lyon and knew of their shared past and recalled how it had affected them both when Ur became nothing more than ice. He remembered the discoveries they made in the ruins, too, as what that woman had told her rat, and it clicked like piece of puzzle he didn't want to see finished.

Deliora, his mind supplied to him with a dark chuckle.

Gray hoped he was wrong.

So, Gray only hissed, "Get them," and Juvia acted on it so fast that Gray thought she'd have done the same regardless of his words.

A wave of water came out of the flourish of her arms, sweeping away the unprepared people gathered there to the ocean beyond the cliff. Lyon had always been fast, however, and he created an ice wall that protected him from it. The wall enclosed him and Gray, too, far from the reach from the other four mages who had avoided the attack and Juvia.

"Go, go, go, Juvia!" Gray yelled when he noticed her disadvantageous situation. "I'll take care of this one." And she did as he told her, thankfully, not without frowning in disapproval, before sprinting away.

"Yuuka, Sherry, Toby! Take care of the girl," Lyon commanded with a precision that didn't allow room for discussion. "Gray's mine."

"And I?" asked the only remaining person of crooked posture and indigenous mask. His smile was chilling despite the playful edge.

Lyon paused for a moment, eying the stranger with furrowed brows as if he didn't quite trust the masked man. Then, he said, "Go with them."

Gray saw how Juvia disappeared beyond and down the hill, persecuted by the other three minions of Lyon and the odd man who didn't seem interested in anything at all. He didn't allow himself to commit to the thought of Juvia alone against four mages, though, and glared down on Lyon who did the same.

"You were never one to think too much, always reckless, but that move was suicidal. For her and for you," Lyon commented as he swirled his caped. The bastard. He always had a flare for bad dramatics. "Your lose."

"You don't know her. She can kick all our collective arses," replied Gray, stiffly, but Lyon only snorted as if he had been told an awful joke. "Juvia can take care of herself. As I do. What I wanna know, though, is what you are _doing_ in this dammed island and with that stupid ritual you're pulling."

But Lyon didn't answer, his eyes narrowing with abhorrence, and he attacked with ice and frost that made Gray retaliate with the same strength and element.

Then, they clashed.

ooOOooOOoo

Juvia leaped over the rumbles and lunged to the right when a boulder flied across her. She had intended to go to the coast, just a few kilometers away, but found herself trapped in one of the many enclosed rooms of the ruins with three very furious and apparently very capable mages closing the only entrance behind her.

She whirled around with her lips thinned and faced her opponents with as much courage as she could muster even though her eyes were flickering and feet impatient.

"This'll over in less than five minutes," Eyebrows affirmed as he turned around the edge of the entrance with Doggy, Pigtails and the rat trailing. "Give up now, it's three against one."

"But Lyon-sama was specific on his request," Pigtails complained. " _Take care of the girl_."

Juvia seethed, sending a blast of boiling water against the three opponents. It wasn't a for the most part powerful burst, just a time-buyer that could be as easily avoided as Eyebrows and Doggy, this one laughing, did, but the only woman didn't appear to be as physically active, and she didn't act in time. The rat took the attack in her stead, however, and become a whimpering mass of fat on the floor.

"And now she burnt Angelica! Unforgiveable!" Pigtails screeched as she kneeled down next to the rat. She was weeping and sent the deadliest of glares at Juvia. "I won't forgive you. I won't allow you to get in the way of my love!"

Juvia winced, because she could understand the feeling, and a pang of guilt swarmed her. It didn't last, though; not when the most level-headed of the three counterattacked, unbalancing her.

"Do you actually think," Eyebrows snarled with twisted lips as Doggy sniggered at the side, "that weak attack would have done anything to us, who once were part of one of the most famous guilds of Fiore?"

Juvia sniffled, positioning again. "Lamia Scale."

"Pardon?"

"It was Lamia Scale you belonged to."

They blinked in surprise and Doggy gasped in horror.

"She can read MINDS!" he yelled, almost a sob, with actual fear tainting his face. Juvia's mouth fell when tears pooled on his eyes. "Yuuka, Sherry, she can read my mind. What DOH?!"

Eyebrows and Pigtails weren't as clearly fooled as their friend, one knocking her off with magic that bypassed her water body and the furious woman stringing rocks and moss into live to throw a punch that left her out of breathe.

"Toby, attack you too!" Eyebrows commanded angrily, and despite the perceptible fear on Doggy's face, his nails extended and scratched her right arm. It not only left a mark, but zapped her arm as well since he seemed to have electric magic imbued, before she stumbled backwards out of their reach.

It had been long since Juvia had last felt this kind of physical pain with her water body granting an impassible defense that had never failed her. Three adversaries were too much for her, though, unless she resorted for the curse that was only and exclusively for hopeless situations where her dear ones were in danger.

Not for this; not yet.

She might not have like them, but she didn't want them dead, either.

So Juvia inhaled deeply, rejected the pessimism out of her mind and took in what she could, in search of something she could use. The room was flooded to their toes with her previous attack, some rumbles scattered, the doll of the female looming and her opponents seemed to be basking on her deplorable state.

And there was, dared she say glancing at Doggy with his electrified nails, an idiot too.

It was high-stake bet. A bet she was ready to take because there was nothing else she could do other than going on a rampage, however, so she did.

And, anyway, she had always had good luck if the all-nighters playing card games with a sore-loser, stubborn Gray-sama were anything to go by.

"Doggy-san," Juvia gasped with a too dramatic of an expression," are those leeches around your feet?!"

Doggy's eyes widened, his expression turning into disgust and panic as he ducked hurriedly. "Where, where, where?!"

"TOBY, NO! YOU IMBECILE!" the other two ordered but it was too late by then.

"Ooohn."

His hands plunged into the water, searching for the animal that never existed, and as soon as his nails made contact with the water, the electric crack echoed in the room. Juvia gritted her teeth for what was to come, her body transformed into her more resistant demonic body, as she watched her adversaries curling down into the floor with a last, pain-filled scream ripping from their throats.

It wasn't much better for her, despite the scales and the extra layers of defense, and she screamed as loudly. But she had fared far better than the other three unconscious forms, only remains of slight paralysis hindering her once she reverted back from her gills and overly focused mentality.

Looking at them, Juvia hoped with every fiber of her being that the electric magic that man used wasn't potent enough to cast irreversible damage on them.

"That's some incredible power you showed there."

The new voice startled her to the core, and she didn't spin fast enough to encounter a new man perched one of the bigger rocks in the room, away from the water. It baffled her how the man got there with her not noticing, and glared when he only cocked his head to the side.

"Who are you?" asked Juvia.

"An ally."

She frowned. "Juvia's or theirs?"

"Hmmm." He smiled languidly. "Good question."

The man leapt from his position to land next to her, his mask looking up with all its hidden promises. The smile was poignant, playful and almost vile around the edges from close view. Juvia moved away from him, her insides churning violently. There was something very important she couldn't pinpoint about this one, and everything took a spin to the worse with the man's next words that made her recoil.

"But the better question is: what was that magic you used to avoid the full impact of the electrocution?" he whispered with curiosity. And then, added, "Or better yet, _what_ are you?"

ooOOooOOoo

The ground quaked for a moment, the ice pillars turning into icy dust as they clashed before everything turned silent and immobile.

"Using both hands?" was the only thing Lyon said after their little dance of attacking and defending. "It shows who was, and still is, the better mage."

Gray scoffed, shaking his head. "I just follow Ur's teaching. Always use both hands."

"You're the last person who should say that, Gray." Lyon's tone was bitter, and Gray flinched as answer. "You never listened to her when it mattered. She died because of that, too."

Gray didn't have much to add to that, because it was true, partially, as much as it pained him. There was something more going on, however, and he couldn't allow Lyon to get away with it if he's suspicions were remotely correct.

Gray swallowed the shame and the pain, boxed it on a shelf for later, and kept a steady gaze even though Lyon's glare pierced him to the core.

"I know," Gray admitted, words cracking at the end. "But whatever you're doing here, in this island, stop it."

The silence was heavy and Gray had the awful sensation of his lips trembling with impotence. This was too much, in a sense, for him. Felt it, as well—the guilt and the loathing and the fear swirling. But he held upright, firm and tense, even when Lyon's face darkened and his mouth curled into anger and hate.

"Do you remember," Lyon said, almost conversationalist although the tension crept through his arms, "what was the thing I wanted more than anything? My dream?"

It didn't take much to remember. Lyon had made it a sure thing to memorize when they were young and it rolled in Gray's tongue as easily. "Surpass Ur."

The other nodded sharply. "But she's dead, you see. Because of you. Kind of difficult in those circumstances."

Then his grin widened, burning Gray's hopes into nothing more than ashes, and with a flourish of a hand, Lyon continued as if he was given a class for children. "Unless I defeat—"

"—unless you beat what Ur couldn't beat," Gray spew furiously. His hand reached his hair, messing it. "Is that even possible? Iced Shell's the ultimate—"

"All magic can be countered with research, patience and the adequate resources," Lyon barked, throwing away the helmet that had stayed under his arm the whole time and clued Gray into stepping back for a surprise attack. "So I did my research, found an old, forgotten magic that could speed up the process to weaken any magic in this same island you're so obsessed with and, after three years, here I am, almost done."

His snarl was vicious, his voice thick as he came closer and the temperature dropped significantly, frost spreading around their feet. "And then, you came around."

Gray was on the verge of snapping back, his fingers contracting ready for action, but a deep breath after, he refrained himself. Ur wouldn't want this, was the mantra repeated in his head. Ur would never, ever want this for them. For him. For Lyon.

 _Gray_ didn't want this. And he doubted Lyon did. Or hoped for that, at least.

"So you wasted three years of your life on _this_?" he sniped. "Do you even _understand_ what are you doin'?"

Lyon's response came quickly in the form of an attack through mobile ice eagles.

"Reaching my dreams so I can keep going!" he yelled as Gray barely managed to avoid the birds.

The birds crashed down, leaving in their weak superficial cuts on his skin while Gray huffed with an angry scowl. Spears came out of his hands although little did they do against Lyon's quick defense.

"Listen for once, this is _wrong._ Have you seen what you did to those people in the village?" he tried to reason for one last time, pressing on even when the only reaction was that of a bitter snort. "Ur would never let you—"

Lyon laughed at that, and Gray recoiled into raised fists and tense muscles.

"She's dead!" he shouted and that was it. "She's dead and she can't lecture us anymore because you never listened to her. Save your hypocrisy for those who are willing to listen to you."

He attacked as soon as Gray's shoulders slumped in defeat, a huge ape made of blocks of ice morphing behind him. The statue raised its hand into the air before it smacked down where Gray stood.

"I'm gonna stop you, Lyon," he screamed behind his improvised shield. "What're you doing is beyond stupid."

"It's presumptuous enough that you mention Ur. More so as constantly as you do," Lyon gritted back. "Now you said you're going to stop _me_. Absolutely hysterical. Fuck you, Gray."

Gray sneered and clashed his two fists together. "Same goes for you."

The next movement was a full-out attack with no pullbacks. Their ice and frost met in the middle of their battlefield, sending shards as sharps as knives around them.

It didn't end there, however. While their creations of ice collided, the floor crumbled under them. The ancient, run-down temple yielded with the powerful impact and the extra weight, and, what was once firm stone to walk on, broke into huge pieces that fell down to the floors bellow.

And they fell down with it.


End file.
